A former journalist at the Yorkshire Post and YorkshireLive has been given a 24 week suspended sentence and restraining order.
58-year-old Robert Sutcliffe was found guilty of harassing 4 women over a period of 7 months, including two colleagues, one of whom he had mentored.
In passing sentence, the judge called him “entitled” adding the “deficit in your thinking skills and in your misogyny is, in my view, clear.”
During his 35 year career, Sutcliffe worked at papers including Yorkshire Post, Telegraph and Argus, Huddersfield Examiner and Yorkshire Live.
His own solicitor admitted to Leeds Magistrates’ Court that it was “impossible to get away from the sexism running through this case.”
The offences which took place in 2023 started with a series of messages and Tweets sent to a YorkshireLive reporter, who he’d previously mentored. They began as criticism of her work, but the “tone changed” and became “hostile” making her “feel intimidated and scared.”
The prosecution, Charles McCrera, said that he sent a picture of himself “from waist-high of his chest and face” and also turned up at her home with a bottle of wine “and lollies” for her children. When he was turned away he sent messages saying they should meet for a “sneaky glass of wine upstairs.”
The reporter took time off work due to stress and started attending meetings online, so as not to see him.
This is when the police came involved and he was given a caution and bailed on condition that he didn’t contact her. “Within hours” he started messaging her and mentioning her in “multiple tweets.”
In a victim impact statement she said:
“Mr Sutcliffe would switch from being pleasant to unpleasant [which was] hugely detrimental to my mental health. I feared the potential repercussions if I attempted to cut off contact.
“When I finally got the courage to stand up to Robert, he made multiple social-media comments about me, making me feel completely humiliated. I have had to stop doing things I enjoy [such as] going to the gym and I will be having counselling.”
During this period Sutcliffe had been suspended, for a different matter – he criticised editor Wayne Ankers and another senior colleague on Twitter over the publication of an inquest report.
The other senior colleague – also a woman – pressed charges after she was “bombarded” by a series of messages and tweets from Sutfcliffe. Some suggesting she’d been “over-promoted” and all having “misogynistic overtones.”
The two other charges related to women at a Huddersfield pub. One gave him her number after he told her he’d help her “get an apprenticeship”
He later left her a message saying he “could have people in a car boot within half an hour, anywhere in the world.”
The prosecution said she thought this was a kidnapping threat.
The fourth victim was in the same pub on the same day and added that she too had been “bombarded” by similar messages from him, in the same 5-hour period.
In his defence, Sutfcliffe’s solicitor, Ben Sayers said that his “identity and self-esteem” was tied up in his job and that the suspension was a “huge trigger point for him and precipitated the worst behaviour”.
“He has been dogged by mental illness, including depression, throughout his life,” he added.
Sayers said that it had been “a humbling process (for him) to attend court in front of a person he has worked with. He has been to his GP and updated his medication and is now attending therapy and taking action to help himself, and is motivated.
“The fog had not fully lifted from his mind until February when the pre-sentence report was done. He has lost everything he has held dear for many years.
“He is remorseful and he has told me he’s ashamed of his behaviour.”
In handing down a 24 week sentence suspended for 18 months, District Judge Hollins said:
“These offences are so serious that neither a fine nor a community order can be justified. The offending behaviour has finally stopped. There was a very careful and detailed probation report that makes for mixed reading. I note you have expressed remorse. I question how much of that is for what you consider you have lost.
“It is notable in this report that you behaved with the probation officer in such a way she has repeatedly commented that you were ‘entitled’. It is very easy to see how she drew such a conclusion and you said to her you are ‘the most famous man in Huddersfield.’
“The deficit in your thinking skills and in your misogyny is, in my view, clear.”
Sutcliffe must also undertake 25 rehabilitation activity days and 250 hours of unpaid work. There is also a restraining order preventing him from contacting the victims directly or indirectly, posting about them on social media. He is also banned from attending the pub where 2 of the offences took place for 3 years.
