Former Doncaster journalist sentenced over campaign of harassment against four women

Robert Sutcliffe, who told a probation officer that he was “the most famous man in Huddersfield”, waged the unrelenting campaign against two former colleagues at the Huddersfield Examiner and Yorkshire Live.

Leeds Magistrates’ Court heard that Sutcliffe “belittled, humiliated” and insulted the two women in Twitter posts and text messages and unfoundedly questioned their professionalism and ability as journalists.

Prosecutor Charles MaCrae said the 58-year-old who had worked for various newspapers in Yorkshire and began his career as editor of the Doncaster Advertiser in 1989, had also sent menacing text messages to two women he knew from a pub in Huddersfield called the Plumbers Arms.

Sutcliffe, of Edgerton Road, Huddersfield, had previously admitted five counts of harassment against the four women.

The women said that Sutcliffe was a “heavy drinker, drinking three to four pints an hour”.

Mr Macrae said that misogyny ran through Sutcliffe’s targeting of all four victims.

Sutcliffe’s solicitor Ben Sayers said the disgraced journalist’s “identity and self-esteem was tied up in (his job)” and that his suspension, after a 34-year career working for major regional titles, was a “huge trigger point for him and precipitated the worst behaviour”.

“He has been dogged by mental illness, including depression, throughout his life,” added Mr Sayers.

He said that Sutcliffe “appears to have lost everything” and had recently lost his new job as general manager at a Huddersfield bar, after his employer learned of the criminal proceedings.

District judge Charlotte Holland told Sutcliffe that the harassment campaign “you subjected these poor women to” had had a profound effect on all four victims who found Sutcliffe’s behaviour “extremely upsetting and distressing”.

She noted a probation officer’s report which Sutcliffe told the officer that he was “the most famous man in Huddersfield”.

Sutcliffe was given a 24-week jail sentence, suspended for 18 months, and was ordered to carry out 250 hours of unpaid work and complete 25 rehabilitation-activity days.

In addition, he was handed a three-year restraining order banning Sutcliffe from contacting the victims, making references to them on social media and going to their homes or workplace.