Teenage jockey tells of stalker torment
'I’m petrified he may be watching'
A TRAINEE jockey has told of her terrifying ordeal at the hands of an obsessed stalker.
The Upper Lambourn teenager said her life had been turned upside down after being targeted by stables employee Vishal Sasane, who, a court heard, had even crept into her bedroom as she slept.
The pair had never been romantically linked – yet 36-year-old Mr Sasane was convinced he was destined to wed 19-year-old Jenny Powell, Reading magistrates heard on Thursday, July 7.
And, despite breaking a court restraining order and defying a suspended prison sentence, he remains free from custody.
Anne Sawyer-Brandish, prosecuting, said Mr Sasane had become obsessed with Miss Powell when he worked for her racehorse trainer father at Frenchmans Lodge, Upper Lambourn.
She added: “The defendant was issued with a restraining order but he broke it within days.”
Ms Sawyer-Brandish said Mr Sasane had brazenly turned up at her home at 8.30pm and, upon finding her out, had knocked on the door of a neighbour named Mrs Griffiths.
She added: “He asked where Jenny was then asked if he could come into her house and use the internet. She let him in and said Jenny was probably out with her boyfriend.”
Mr Sasane immediately demanded to know the boyfriend’s identity and told an increasingly suspicious Mrs Griffiths that he was to marry her instead, the court heard.
She asked him to leave but CCTV footage showed him lurking outside Miss Powell’s home for a further three hours, magistrates were told.
In a victim impact statement read to the court, Miss Powell said before the restraining order was made Mr Sasane had been in her bedroom and added: “I don’t feel safe in my home, feeling he is watching me. He came before when I was asleep. I’m petrified he may be watching.
“But I can’t go out in case he’s snooping about.
“He took pictures from my Facebook page and pictures of me riding out and put them on his phone.
“He would come back after being arrested. I jump at the slightest noise.”
Miss Powell said her work as a trainee jockey had been affected by her taking time off in fear of him.
She added: “This is an infatuation of his – I’ve never been in an intimate relationship with him.”
After he was convicted of stalking on May 10, Mr Sasane was made subject to a restraining order, forbidding him from contacting Miss Powell or going near her home, the court heard.
He was also given a five-week jail sentence, suspended for 12 months.
Mr Sasane admitted breaching the order on June 11.
Court clerk Roy Watson reminded magistrates that the suspended sentence should automatically be activated unless they were persuaded it would be unjust to do so.
But Tom Brymer, defending, pleaded with the court to give his client another chance.
He said Mr Sasane insists he had really only wanted to see Miss Powell’s parents to persuade them to give him his old job back as a stable jockey.
Mr Brymer added: “He thought that if he got his job back the restraining order would somehow disappear.
“He said to me this morning that he won’t contact Miss Powell or break the terms of the order again.”
Mr Brymer said Mr Sasane was currently employed by Richard Hannon Racing in Marlborough, Wiltshire, and his job and nearby home were still available to him despite him having been remanded in custody for the past three weeks.
After reading pre-sentence reports, magistrates said they felt Mr Sasane would benefit more from the help of the probation service than from being locked up.
They sentenced him to another jail sentence, this time of eight weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 18 months.
In addition they required Ms Sasane to complete a 30-day thinking skills programme and to pay £85 costs plus a statutory surcharge of £115.
