CRAIG FLETCHER FROM MEIR SENTENCED TO FIVE AND A HALF YEARS IN STAFFORDSHIRE FOR HARASSMENT AND EXTREMELY GRAPHIC MATERIALS
A stalker who hacked into the social media accounts of a 14-year-old girl and shared explicit images of her has been sentenced to five and a half years in prison.Craig Fletcher, 40, an IT expert from Meir, Staffordshire, developed an obsessive fixation on the young girl’s activities and even threatened violence against her male friends.
Fletcher admitted to two counts of stalking, four counts of sending private photographs without consent, and possession of extreme pornography.
The court heard that Fletcher once entered a McDonald's restaurant and threatened to break a boy's legs if he approached the girl.
On another occasion, he pursued a boy in his car.
After the girl entered into a relationship, Fletcher harassed both her and her boyfriend with sexually explicit messages and hacked into their accounts to distribute private photos among their friends.
Fletcher was arrested in 2017, and authorities discovered a significant collection of extreme pornographic images on his computer, including those depicting animals, sadism, and mutilation.
During sentencing, Judge Christopher Batty stated, “You have never provided an explanation as to why you did this.
But I take the view that it was born out of obsession and nothing else—your campaign caused significant stress to two young people.” The judge added, “You were able to stop this at any time but you did not.
You are now ashamed of what you did but you only have yourself to blame.
This was not a one-off matter; it was a long course of action over many months.” The court heard that both the girl and her boyfriend felt so distressed by the ordeal that they considered suicide.
In court, Fletcher’s defense solicitor, Matthew Harding, read a letter from Fletcher in which he expressed remorse and said he was ‘disgusted’ with himself, revealing that he had ‘lost everything’.
