Ashley Lloyd jailed by King’s Lynn magistrates after harassing woman and autistic child, making bomb threat to school and being caught with knives at Waitrose
A man who harassed a woman until she felt like a “prisoner” in her home has been jailed for a year after making bomb threats to a school and being caught with knives in a public place.
Ashley Lloyd, 35, appeared at Lynn Magistrates’ Court on Thursday to be sentenced for an array of offences. He had previously pleaded guilty to the majority, and admitted to two more last week.
His crimes included possession of two lock knives in a supermarket car park, sending a false bomb threat to a primary school, assaulting police officers, and numerous counts of using threatening behaviour likely to cause harassment or distress.
Lloyd lived in a village near Swaffham at the time he committed them – and a nearby neighbour delivered an emotional victim statement in court which detailed the impact his actions had on both her and her two young children.
Magistrates, led by John Hare, ultimately sentenced Lloyd to a total of 12 months in custody. Six of those were for possession of the bladed articles, while he was handed two 12-week terms for his police assaults – one to be served consecutively, and one concurrently.
He was handed 14 additional weeks behind bars, including two for his Public Order Act breaches.
Mr Hare said: “In our view, these offences are so serious that custody was necessary.”
Lloyd’s offences began on November 23 last year, when he was arrested for both sending a false message to cause inconvenience and being caught with the lock knives.
Crown prosecutor Stephen Munton told magistrates that the defendant had been found with them in the Waitrose car park in Swaffham. On the same day, he had made a phone call reporting that there was a bomb at a primary school – making threats relating to the Bible and religion while doing so.
While he was being transported to custody, officers then also found Lloyd to be in possession of a baseball bat.
Mr Munton then said that between September last year and February this year, Lloyd committed “a number” of public order offences – including harassment – against residents living close to him.
These included shouting and swearing from his back garden on February 24, as well as making references to “cutting people up” a day later. On February 27, he lit a fire in his garden and shouted the words: “Sh*t sh*t, bang bang, dead dead. This is my language, this is how I speak, this is my universe.”
He also told people from his garden that he would shoot them on that date – and when police attended his home in an attempt to arrest him, he lunged at one of them with a lock knife before being taken to the floor.
At 5.40am on March 14, neighbours were woken by shouts referring to his medication. On April 9, he was filmed while displaying abusive language outside his home.
Then, on May 16, police arrived at his house to arrest him in relation to another matter. Lloyd declined to open the door and told officers to “f*ck off”, and they had to force their way in after 20 minutes of refusal.
Despite being told to stay where he was, Lloyd proceeded to say he was going to bed – and he did just that, hiding under a duvet and several blankets. He then called officers “queer c*nts” as they attempted to co-operate with him.
He proceeded to kick one officer in the chest and legs three times.
Finally, on May 29, Lloyd committed what was described in court as a hate crime when he imitated the behaviour and mannerisms of a neighbour’s autistic child. He said he would give the child alcohol to “stop them screeching for five minutes”.
The mother of that child appeared in court to deliver a statement, referring to the “torture” of living in close proximity to Lloyd while he committed his offences.
She said: “It got to the point where I no longer felt safe in my own home. Living next to him became a terrifying experience.
“As a mother I feel I should be able to protect them (her children), but I worry that I would not be able to against him.
“I have never felt so scared in my life as I have in the past six months.”
She added that she was at points scared to leave her home in case she was confronted by Lloyd, leading her to feel as though her home had become a “prison”.
“My partner no longer spends his evenings doing things he likes because he needs to stay in with me,” she said.
“It should be a basic human right to feel safe and secure in your own home. Now I look at my home as a place I can’t wait to leave.”
Magistrates subsequently imposed a ten-year restraining order which will prevent Lloyd from contacting the victim or her children. He has also been forbidden from stepping foot in the village where he lived until that decade is up.
In mitigation, Lisa Robinson told magistrates that Lloyd suffers with a range of mental health conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder, and is bipolar.
She assured the court at he no longer lives in the village, and now resides at Wellington Road in Dereham.
“It is a real mixing pot of issues here,” the solicitor said.
She assured magistrates that Lloyd’s bomb threat was “not genuine” – and said he was suspicious that people living close to him had tampered with his car.
“Again, not an excuse – but an explanation as to why someone in Mr Lloyd’s position was behaving the way he was,” Ms Robinson added.
She also said that there was never any malicious intent behind Lloyd’s possession of the lock knives – and on his threatening of others, she said: “This is not personal in the sense that he is going out of his way harassing her. She was a neighbour.”
Magistrates also ordered Lloyd to pay £200 in legal costs and a £154 victim surcharge.