A man who pursued his ex-girlfriend to Tyndrum – and on as far as the North West Highlands – while she was on a camper van holiday was this week fined £900.
Daryl Garrity had alarmed the woman, on a break with friends, by entering the camper van while it was parked on the outskirts of Tyndrum and Ullapool.
The 26-year-old had admitted a charge of engaging in a course of conduct which caused his former partner fear and alarm between November 2 and 5 last year.
He further pleaded guilty to breaching a bail condition forbidding him from attempting to communicate, or attempting to communicate, with the complainer by contacting her on January 8 this year. Fiscal depute Sean Isles told Stirling Sheriff Court on Wednesday that the complainer had been in a relationship with the accused for around three to four months, but it had come to an end in October.
The complainer was in the vehicle with her friends heading north on Tuesday, November 2 last year when she noticed that Garrity was driving in a car behind them.
When the camper van stopped just outside of Tyndrum in a lay-by near a camp site, the accused “invited himself” into the van, Mr Isles said.
The complainer asked Garrity to leave and he refused.
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However, he eventually left and the complainer and her friends continued their journey north.
On the evening of Thursday, November 4 the camper van was parked just outside Ullapool.
But on the morning of Friday November 5 around 6am Garrity entered the camper van, asking to speak to the complainer. He was again asked to leave.
The police were called and the accused drove away in his car. He wasn’t traced until Sunday, November 7.
Garrity’s agent Virgil Crawford told Sheriff Derek Hamilton that his client had been due to go on the holiday – and while there were difficulties, his view was the relationship was not at an end, adding that the accused had “perhaps been trying to salvage it”.
Garrity, however, “had learned the error of his ways”.
He had met the complainer while working in a restaurant in the Callander area and “clearly had difficulties with the end of the relationship”.
Garrity, of Newton Mearns, had a brief criminal record, Mr Crawford said, comprising a road traffic matter and a previous domestic matter.
His parents were opposed to any tagging equipment being installed in the family home.
However, the accused was willing to pay a substantial financial penalty.
Sentencing Garrity, Sheriff Derek Hamilton told him that there were a number of things that were of concern.
He added: “This course of behaviour took place over a number of days and you seem to have travelled quite some distance following this woman.
“You already have a previous conviction for a domestically aggravated offence” which gave the sheriff “concern about your behaviour towards females.”
There was also the matter of breaching bail conditions.
Sheriff Hamilton fined Garrity £900 reduced from £1,000 due to his guilty plea, payable at a rate of £50 per week, plus a surcharge of £40.
A Community Payback Order of 90 hours’ unpaid work, reduced from 100 hours, on the breach of bail charge was also imposed –along with a six-month non-harrassment order forbidding Garrity from approaching or contacting, or trying to approach or contact, the complainer.
