Obsessed government worker hounded female colleague with love songs and poems
15.09.2023 - 03:50
/ dailyrecord.co.uk
An obsessed government worker hounded a former colleague by sending her love songs he'd written and recorded for her in the run up to her wedding.
Civil servant William Darroch, 61, also penned poems for Ainsley McArthur and inundated her with WhatsApp messages and emails over a four-month period.
The contact led to her telling him not to attend her wedding and left her terrified he was going to turn up at the service, Greenock Sheriff Court heard.
Darroch first met Ainsley in 2008 when they both started working for the Department for Work and Pensions in Glasgow. She left the government body in 2019.
But they remained in contact and in June 2020 he sent her a WhatsApp message, then refused to stop contacting her when she asked him to.
The court heard he wrote and recorded four songs for her and sent her a poem shortly before her wedding. She called in police over the harassment, after Darroch, of Greenock, Inverclyde, ignored her pleas to leave her alone.
But he continued to contact her after being spoken to by officers, and also turned up to a night out she was on. She told his trial he stared at her, while making repeated attempts to talk to her.
The court heard he was eventually ejected from the Greenock cocktail bar in question by a bouncer. She broke down in tears as she recalled his conduct in the witness box.
Ainsley explained: "He sent a message telling me he missed me and had written songs about me and wanted me to have them.
"He sent four songs to me which were all very personal and quite alarming. I told him they should be directed at his partner and that if my husband knew about them he wouldn't be happy.
"They were recorded by Mr Darroch about me, on guitar and playing the mouth organ.
"He was describing in detail