'˜Dangerous' stalker is sent to prison

David Goldie had been released from custody the previous Thursday, placed on orders with conditions that he should not attempt to contact the woman involved in the next three years, but on the Sunday had emailed her.

Sheriff Nikola Stewart told Goldie when he appeared from custody again on Wednesday afternoon: “I took the view that you are very dangerous. I expressed that to you on Thursday.”

She said that she had taken the view that the original case which involved contacting his victim over months s “was a thoroughly alarming stalking case” and that she had believed he would not stop; but had hoped, when she released him on court orders, that she was wrong.

“Only days later you have again thrust your attention on this poor harrassed lady who wants nothing to do with you.”

And she told Goldie: “In her interest and the public interest I have to make an example of you.

“I have to send you to prison because, if I don’t, you will again make unwelcome overtures to this lady, despite the clear and unusually stringent measures that I have taken to stop you doing that.”

Goldie (36) of 35 Braidwood Road, Carluke, originally appeared from custody at the court on March 9, when he admitted placing the woman in a state of fear and alarm on a number of occasions between September 1 and January 27, at addresses in Carluke and elsewhere, repeatedly attending at her home, even turning up in the early hours of a morning and staring in, and finally, entering her mother’s house uninvited, going upstairs to a bedroom where the woman was sleeping and uttering threats to the terrified woman and refusing to leave.

Sheriff Stewart had remanded Goldie in custody for three weeks for reports, and then on the Thursday released him with the non-harrassment order.

On Wednesday his solicitor said that Goldie accepted that sending the email was a breach of the order. And while the email seemed “contrite and apologetic” the solicitor knew any contact could be construed as sinister.

Sheriff Stewart sent Goldie to prison for four months.