Stalking

A person must not stalk another person.
Penalty: Level 5 imprisonment (10 years maximum).

Stalking includes:
- following the victim or any other person;
- contacting the victim or any other person by post, telephone, fax, text message, e-mail or other electronic communication or by any other means whatsoever;
- publishing on the Internet or by an e-mail or other electronic communication to any person a statement or other material relating to the victim or any other person; orpurporting to relate to, or to originate from, the victim or any other person;
- entering or loitering outside or near the victim's or any other person's place of residence or of business or any other place frequented by the victim or the other person;
- keeping the victim or any other person under surveillance;

For the purposes of stalking, an offender also has the intention to cause physical or mental harm to the victim, including self-harm, or to arouse apprehension or fear in the victim for his or her own safety or that of any other person if
- the offender knows that engaging in a course of conduct of that kind would be likely to cause such harm or arouse such apprehension or fear; or
- the offender in all the particular circumstances ought to have understood that engaging in a course of conduct of that kind would be likely to cause such harm or arouse such apprehension or fear and it actually did have that result.

It is a defence to the charge for the accused to prove that the course of conduct was engaged in without malice.

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