British singer Nicola Roberts has won an apology from officials at Britain's Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) after they dropped a case against her ex-boyfriend after he breached his restraining order.
Carl Davies, who dated the former Girls Aloud singer for 18 months until 2008, was given a 15-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, and lifetime restraining order preventing him from contacting or going within 250 metres of Roberts or her family in May 2017, months after he was arrested for sending threatening messages to the 32-year-old via 35 different social media accounts.
Months later, he was charged with breaching the restraining order by viewing her Instagram posts between July and August 2017, but the CPS dropped the case, with a judge simply extending the ban to prevent Davies checking her social media accounts.
In an interview with Britain's Sunday Times newspaper, Nicola spoke about her dismay with the way the case was handled, and revealed that she had received an apology from the CPS.
"We accept our decision not to prosecute the breach of the order was incorrect," the CPS statement read. "We have written to Ms Roberts to apologise and have taken steps to ensure lessons are learned from the case.
"We fully appreciate the impact stalking and harassment has on victims and we take prosecuting these cases extremely seriously. We regularly update our legal guidance to keep up with changes in technology, including social media platforms."
The singer claimed to the publication that prosecutors regarded the case "trivial" because the threats were made online, even though the experience left her too scared to keep her window open at night.
"When somebody sends a message saying, 'Those are nice pyjamas' you think 'is he able to see into my house?' she recalled. "You are too scared to take the dogs out for a walk because when someone plants vicious seeds you just imagine every possible outcome.
"This is a relationship which ended 10 years ago. I should be able to move on from an unhealthy relationship if I want to and that has not been able to happen for me."
Nicola now is offering to help coach CPS officials about social media to help others avoid her "terrifying" experience.
