What is National Stalking Awareness Week?

National Stalking Awareness Week run from Monday, April 24 until Friday April 28, with partner organisations across the UK holding events to raise awareness of stalking and the effect it can have on people.

National Stalking Awareness Week is spearheaded by the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, a national organisation which forms part of the National Stalking Consortium. This year the focus is on helping police and support workers recognise the signs of stalking at an early stage, and focusing on the motives of the stalker, not just on specific incidents or behaviour.

What is Stalking?
Stalking is unwanted, persistent or obsessive attention by an individual or group towards another person causing fear, harassment, anxiety, emotional or psychological distress to the victim. Stalking behaviours are related to harassment and intimidation and may include nuisance telephone calls, sending excessive emails, regularly sending gifts, following the person or spying on them and death threats. A perpetrator of stalking may be a partner or ex-partner, a work colleague or someone unknown to the victim.

The effect of such behaviour is to curtail a victim’s freedom, leaving them feeling that they constantly have to be careful. In many cases, the conduct might appear innocent (if it were to be taken in isolation), but when carried out repeatedly so as to amount to a course of conduct, it may then cause significant alarm, harassment or distress to the victim.

 

 

For more information about the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, click here:

For information about help available locally, click here: