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Molly McLaren did everything to report her stalker ex. So how did he stab her 75 times?
She did everything ‘right’
by Katie Way
23-year-old Molly McLaren dated Joshua Stimpson for around four months before breaking up with him for the last time on June 17, 2017.
On June 29, 2017, Stimpson followed McLaren to her gym in Kent, a suburb of London. He worked out beside her for a few minutes before "leaving."
"Feel like I'm fucking looking over my shoulder all the time," she messaged a friend after he showed up. Then she left the gym, and he stabbed her to death and cut her throat in the parking lot outside, where he'd been waiting for her.
Stimpson was found guilty of her murder on Tuesday and sentenced to life in prison
McLaren had gone to the police
Stimpson and McLaren met on Tinder, and after they broke up he began posting rumors about McLaren's drug usage on Facebook. This prompted her to go to the police — and apparently she wasn't Stimpson's first ex to do so.
Another woman he dated had also gone to the police
He messaged her threatening to drown her, and slashed her car tires.
McLaren's friends and family were well aware of Stimpson's threatening behavior. When he showed up to the gym, she immediately messaged her mother and a friend who called him a "freak" and told McLaren to be careful.
Molly McLaren did everything that you're "supposed" to do when a man is threatening you
She alerted authorities, she avoided him as much as possible, and she alerted her loved ones of the situation. A passerby even intervened while Stimpson attacked McLaren.
The 2016 Crime Survey of England and Wales, commissioned by the UK government, defined stalking as "2 or more incidents causing fear or alarm," including threatening messages, following or watching. Stimspon's former partners experienced all of the above.
And data from analysis conducted by the Suzy Lamplugh Trust suggests many police departments in the United Kingdom underreport stalking, even though staking complains comprised almost 21% of all intimate partner violence against women in 2016, according to the CSEW.
Women can make all the 'right' moves and tell all the 'right' people when they're victims of stalking, but at the end of the day, it's up to law enforcement to take them seriously and stop men like Joshua Stimpson before they physically carry out the psychological violence they inflict on their victims.