Stalking victim’s dad urges law change to over death fears

Victims of stalking are at greater risk of dying if the government fails to publish and act on the recommendations of a review of stalking laws, the father of a murdered woman has said.

Alice Ruggles was killed in her Gateshead flat in October 2016 by her ex-boyfriend Trimaan Dhillon, who had been stalking her.

The review of current legislation by Richard Wright KC was submitted to ministers six months ago. Clive Ruggles said: “We’ve got to do something about this and that involves just the government acting – get this report out.”

The government said the stalking legislation review and its response would be published “imminently” and it was strengthening the use of stalking protection orders.

Wright was the prosecuting barrister in the trial of Dhillon, who was found guilty of murdering the 24-year-old and jailed for 22 years.

Alice’s family has campaigned ever since for better education and laws around stalking, and set up the Alice Ruggles Trust in her name.

Clive Ruggles said: “Our whole mission in life at the moment is to try and stop what happened to Alice happening to others.

“It’s tremendously frustrating. We’ve got to move on this. People are still suffering from stalking, people are still dying.

“We’ve got to do something about this and that involves just the government acting. Get this report out. We can look at it and get it moving into law.”