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on october the 12th
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2016 24 year old alice ruggles left work
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with a colleague who drove her home to
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her apartment in gateshead near
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newcastle england
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she would never be seen alive again it
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was just 12 days between her calling the
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police and her being murdered when alice
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arrived home from work someone was
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waiting for her her ex-boyfriend
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trimming harry dylan
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a man she had rejected she said no
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and that proved to be fatal this wasn't
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a case of an assault that escalated to
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murder this was always going to be a
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murder this was pre-planned alice
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thought she was finally free of dylan
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and could move on with her life i can't
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forget this he's said i always get what
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i want you know i always get my own way
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i've been like that since i was a little
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child coming home from work alice's
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flatmate found her in the bathroom lying
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in a pool of blood getting back to my
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flat in the doorway so i crawled through
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the window and my back needs covered in
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blood in the bathroom harry dylan forced
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his way in
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and he was armed with a knife
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and inside the bathroom he attacked her
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with that knife with such force and such
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severity
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that the knife made contact with a spine
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at the back of her throat
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trimming harry dylan didn't love alice
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ruggles he wanted to possess her control
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her and ultimately destroy her
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the only way he could stop her leaving
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him was to brutally murder her making
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trimming harry dylan one of the world's
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most evil killers
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[Music]
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so
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october the 11th 2015
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25 year old lance corporal truman dillon
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or halle to his friends was serving as a
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signaler with his regiment in
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afghanistan when he saw a photograph of
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23 year old alice ruggles on facebook
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harry instantly reached out and his
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friend request was accepted
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the two of them hit it off and begun an
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intense social media relationship
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and that went on for two or three months
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while he was posted out in afghanistan
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so we first heard about it or i first
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heard about it on
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christmas that year when alice came home
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and she was talking about him then
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and
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um
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we got the impression he was her
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boyfriend
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but actually at that point they'd never
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met i think at the time if i'd known
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alice hadn't met him and had said he was
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her boyfriend i would have been quite
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shocked but i didn't discover that
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unfortunately till after she'd been
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murdered
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the speed and intensity of dylan's
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relationship with alice was nothing new
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for him he would meet a woman profess
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almost immediate love for her that a
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very intense relationship would develop
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that he would seek to control that
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relationship and control his partner
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all the time cheating on them behind
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their backs dylan's possessive
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controlling behavior began to take its
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toll on alice well it became obvious
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that alice was becoming unhappy
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the fact that she was she was losing
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weight she looked physically different
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um she lost her verve and vigor for life
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she was losing friends all over the
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place
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the cheating and dylan's lying was the
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final straw for alice leaving a
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relationship can be a very high risk
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time for violence and for homicide
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because by leaving by making the
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decision to go um you're compromising
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the perpetrator's control over you
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and no woman was allowed to walk away
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from trimming harry dylan
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if he couldn't have her
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nobody else could
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this killer's story begins in 1990 in
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india
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dylan was the only child born into an
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affluent devout sikh family
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trim and dylan is something of an enigma
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we don't know a lot about his background
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we know that he's from india we know
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that his father was quite high ranking
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in the army we know that his mother was
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a graduate of a high profile university
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in india
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as a boy truman received a first class
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education he went on to study strategy
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management at university which involves
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spending two years overseas at the queen
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margaret university near edinburgh in
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scotland
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you know he has quite a traditional
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nuclear family background there
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beyond that we don't know very much but
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i think we can say that what is
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important to him are things like
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hierarchy and status and power and
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tradition and he might have some quite
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fixed ideas of what relationships look
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like
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in september 2010 at the age of 19
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truman dylan arrived in the uk
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he became known as harry amongst his
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fellow students
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in december while still at university
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harry applied to join the british army
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which you i suppose you would expect son
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of an army lieutenant colonel
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probably always thought of himself
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certainly as a an army type
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liked something about it
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dylan's uk citizenship was not complete
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so he couldn't apply to become an army
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officer
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he trained at caterick in north
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yorkshire and passed out in may 2012 as
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a private
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he was posted with the royal regiment of
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scotland to canterbury in kent
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so you can see inside this young man
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quite handsome
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when he wants to be relatively charming
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but also
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there's something odd you know that's
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that's something
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about him
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i think one or two of his army
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colleagues described him as not really
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one of us it was just something slightly
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off
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it was in kent in september 2012
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that harry dylan met an 18 year old
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bulgarian student who later became his
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girlfriend
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and this was a relationship that had
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proceeded at an incredibly fast pace and
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that's something that we see very often
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in these abusive situations where
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somebody like dylan is taking control of
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somebody else in the spring of 2013
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dylan proposed delighted with his
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engagement the next day he returned to
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india alone to visit his family for a
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few weeks
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this break however gave his young
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fiancee time to reconsider their
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relationship
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she dumped him
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on skype
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which
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absolutely infuriated him
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um and he flew back from india early
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and really
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lost his temper in in every way
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to add insult to injury dylan's now
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ex-fiance had a new boyfriend dylan
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doesn't take it lying down and one of
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his characteristics is he can't stand
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rejection he absolutely hates it he
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believes he's entitled to things i was
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entitled as a child i'm entitled as an
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adult
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if you're the woman i've chosen then i'm
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entitled to you dylan started stalking
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her and harassing her with derogatory
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and unpleasant texts telling her he
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wanted to make her cry
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she's on her way to meet her new partner
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and there's an incident where he spits
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in her face he acts very aggressively
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towards her new partner and he uses
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language like what are you doing with my
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girlfriend this is my girlfriend it's
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all possessive language so he sees this
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ex-partner as something that he owns and
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no other man has the right to take that
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away from him
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after the assault his ex-fiance reported
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dylan to the police but no criminal
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charges were brought against him
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he was later issued with a restraining
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order to stay away from her it's
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incredibly common for people like dylan
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to assault ex-girlfriends more than once
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to engage in any kind of behaviour to
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take that control back so this is not a
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flash in the pan this is not a one-off
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this kind of behavior is part of a
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course of conduct
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it was easy for dylan to comply with the
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restraining order against him
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shortly after the incident in kent he
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was deployed almost 500 miles away to
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glenn course barracks in edinburgh
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scotland
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dylan was a signaler in the british army
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with ambitions to join the special
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reconnaissance regiment of the sas
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by now he's a lance corporal he's been
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promoted
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you can see a sort of swagger in him in
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his step and you can see
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impressionable
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perhaps younger
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women
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being rather taken
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with him
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25 year old dylan regularly used dating
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sites apps and social media to hook up
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with women
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he was clearly uh highly motivated when
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it came to female company i think he
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fancied himself as a bit of a gigolo
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actually
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that he thought i can have any woman i
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want
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i think there was a lot of that
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about him
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in september
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2015 harry dylan was deployed with his
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regiment to afghanistan he was not a
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combat soldier his role was essentially
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in communications far from the front
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line
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on the 11th of october 2015
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while serving in afghanistan harry dylan
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saw a facebook post from an old
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university friend dylan first saw alice
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on social media she was a friend of one
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of his friends on social media and i
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think dylan sees this platform as a bit
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of a shopping catalog for new
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girlfriends he's literally going on
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there liking the look of alice and
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saying i want that one
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the post dylan saw was a selfie snap of
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his friend on holiday in sri lanka with
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a girlfriend
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the girlfriend was 23 year old alice
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ruggles a northumbria university
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graduate who lived in gateshead near
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newcastle just over 100 miles from
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edinburgh
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it really does reinforce that extent to
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which he sees women as objects as
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possessions that he can just select so
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he gets in touch with alice's friends
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and says this is one of the most
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beautiful women i've ever seen i have to
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meet her words to that effect and this
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is how they they first come to meet
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and i think this really does set the
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tone for the relationship i'm in control
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i am choosing you i'm the one that has
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power trimming harry dylan had found his
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new obsession
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october the 11th
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2015 sri lanka
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alice ruggles was on holiday when she
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received a facebook friend request from
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trimmin harry dylan
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alice was careful with her social media
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accounts but harry was a friend of a
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friend and she happily accepted his
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request
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it wasn't that she was desperate for
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somebody to go out with she just
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she you know she liked meeting people um
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she probably had lots of people who
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wanted to go out with her
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but she wasn't someone who would lead
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people on she just you know if it was
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the right thing that's what she do dylan
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and alice began chatting and hit it off
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from then on they were in constant
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communication
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and by the time we got to about december
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alice was
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telling telling everyone she was in a
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relationship with this person she put it
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on facebook that she was in a
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relationship and she told me that he was
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her new boyfriend but there was one
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thing alice didn't make clear to her mum
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i actually didn't realize that she'd
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never met him
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he was a soldier serving in afghanistan
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so obviously they couldn't meet up
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but but i think you know moving forward
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at that pace and describing yourself as
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partners
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is wrong really if you haven't met each
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other it's you're just friends to me but
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it's a sort of sign that
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somebody is a controlling person if they
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make the relationship move faster than
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it naturally should
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i think this is where the control had
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started to come in so offenders like
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dylan are able to control from a
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distance you don't need them to be
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physically present to be exerting quite
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a lot of power over their partners
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in january
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2016 just over three months since they'd
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met on facebook dylan came home on leave
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and the couple finally met in person
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and they had a lovely time and alice um
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alice was so taken by him she said he
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was kind and thoughtful and he paid for
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things and he he just wanted to keep her
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happy that was how she saw it and she
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said mom i think he's he is the one he's
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just wonderful
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and they spent a week in newcastle
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together and then they spent a week in
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edinburgh together after two wonderful
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weeks dylan returned to afghanistan to
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finish his tour and the couple continued
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their intense social media relationship
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but one of the problems about the whole
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facebook thing was
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that he was some
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he was quite controlling about that and
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he wanted to know
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where she was
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and who she was going out with what she
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was wearing
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and all those all those things that
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sort of can be disguised as being really
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caring and thoughtful you know like i
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really want to know what you're wearing
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and i want to know where you are and i
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want to know who you're with
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but if you look at them from the other
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side actually they're really quite
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sinister
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unfortunately i don't think alice saw
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them as sinister at all at the time
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in april
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2016 dylan's tour in afghanistan ended
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and he was deployed back to barracks in
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edinburgh
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once back in the uk dylan was keen to
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meet alice's family
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we first met him and then it was maybank
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holiday weekend so they came down for
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the weekend
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and i
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i remember thinking that i mean looking
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back on this there was nothing at the
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time
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and this is one of those scary things
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nothing at the time that made me think i
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don't like this guy
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there's something you know not not not
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right about this guy really nothing i
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mean yes i could tell him i could tell
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that he was giving the answers to
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to questions you know that he wanted me
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to hear and this sort of thing but i'm
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guessing a lot of lads could have done
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that
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so
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there was nothing that that i picked up
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at that time that led me to think there
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was anything worrying about him things
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don't start off
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in an abusive way things start off with
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this individual being everything that
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the ideal boyfriend is supposed to be
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because if abusers were abusive all of
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the time nobody would go out with them
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nobody would date them nobody would
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marry them so he's got that initial
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charm offensive down to a real t
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it wasn't long before alice's family and
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friends began to notice changes in her
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behavior one of the things that had
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happened
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was that alice had fallen out with the
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boys she shared a house with
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which was really unusual for her she
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didn't tend to fall out with people like
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that he just sort of amplified
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everything that was happening to make it
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an unhappy
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um
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atmosphere in the house
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and then he started saying to alice um
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that he he had some money and he would
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buy a flat in newcastle and she could
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live in the flat this talk about
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possibly um buying how so she could live
00:16:56
in it and this sort of thing
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you know they've only been
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seeing each other for a couple of months
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is is pushing things worryingly fast
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alice's demeanor also began to change
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and there were sort of
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attempts to undermine her confidence and
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make her feel that she was
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not really a worthy person which is
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it's not really how she felt i mean she
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was quite secure in how she was about
00:17:22
herself
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and and he managed to make her feel
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more insecure which is
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unfortunately something we didn't really
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notice
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creeping on
00:17:33
[Music]
00:17:36
there were several tactics that dylan
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used when he was essentially breaking
00:17:41
down alice's self-confidence because
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this is what this is all about it's it's
00:17:45
a liberty crime it's about taking away
00:17:47
somebody's sense of self and he starts
00:17:49
off with these little criticisms and
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they're they're kind of veiled
00:17:53
criticisms because very often they're
00:17:55
presented as
00:17:56
something that i only have your best
00:17:59
interests at heart or i'm only trying to
00:18:01
help you this is just a suggestion and
00:18:03
then you start with the criticisms
00:18:05
becoming you know a little bit more
00:18:07
cutting and then it descends into to
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even more you know humiliation and
00:18:12
control
00:18:15
alice started to become isolated from
00:18:17
her friends
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even the best friend who'd introduced
00:18:21
her to dylan on facebook just six months
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ago
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and i was really shocked by that because
00:18:27
that's
00:18:28
you know i'm quite feminist and that's
00:18:31
not be told what to do and i said well
00:18:33
why is that and and she said oh well
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because we had a bit of an argument
00:18:37
about something and and he said that
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she's a poisonous person and he doesn't
00:18:42
want me to be around anybody who's so
00:18:44
poisonous and horrible
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when we look at alice we don't see
00:18:48
somebody who we might consider to be a
00:18:50
stereotypical victim of abuse she's
00:18:53
somebody who's independent she's
00:18:55
go-getting she's gregarious she's got a
00:18:57
really good network of friends and i
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think there's a sense in which dylan saw
00:19:02
her as a bit of a challenge to be honest
00:19:04
um he thought if i can break this person
00:19:07
you know i really am fantastic
00:19:11
over the next couple of months she
00:19:13
started to to lose weight a bit and she
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started to
00:19:18
well
00:19:19
she was starting to lose confidence and
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as we discovered she was starting to
00:19:22
lose friends
00:19:31
dylan was an incredibly controlling
00:19:33
person and he he set in place a lot of
00:19:36
rules around relationships he was very
00:19:39
critical of alice talking to male
00:19:42
friends engaging with male colleagues at
00:19:44
work
00:19:45
he had this paranoia that she was
00:19:47
cheating on him and he would constantly
00:19:49
be sharing these views with her
00:19:55
but alice wasn't the one doing the
00:19:58
cheating but all the time he was doing
00:20:00
all of this stuff behind alice's back so
00:20:03
he was contacting other women online he
00:20:06
was arranging to meet up with them he
00:20:07
was having casual sex with them so
00:20:09
there's an awful lot of double standards
00:20:11
going on and that's because he feels
00:20:13
completely entitled to behave in this
00:20:15
way and this is the the very essence of
00:20:18
misogyny this is it's one set of rules
00:20:20
for me and it's a whole other set of
00:20:22
rules for you
00:20:23
one of the women dylan was in contact
00:20:26
with messaged alice and told her what
00:20:28
her boyfriend was up to
00:20:30
and this is the final straw for her
00:20:33
because alice has a very clear line and
00:20:35
sand when it comes to relationships
00:20:38
clearly and she's not going to tolerate
00:20:40
this kind of behavior i think this is
00:20:42
testament to alice's strength of
00:20:43
character and her moral compass despite
00:20:46
dylan's denial that he was cheating on
00:20:49
her alice didn't believe him
00:20:51
there had been too many lies
00:20:54
in a tearful phone call to her mum alice
00:20:57
told her that she'd ended their
00:20:59
relationship i don't think he actually
00:21:02
knows what the truth is i don't think he
00:21:03
knows what being honest is all about
00:21:08
but alice honesty was such an important
00:21:10
thing that she really felt
00:21:13
uncomfortable about that
00:21:15
but dylan being dylan
00:21:17
never takes no
00:21:18
for an answer
00:21:20
he goes into full manipulative mode
00:21:24
he can't have his masculinity questioned
00:21:27
by some mere woman
00:21:28
it's a very misogynist
00:21:30
it's a very male dominant attitude
00:21:34
and
00:21:35
it unfortunately extends to
00:21:38
the worst possible outcome
00:21:43
in early august
00:21:44
2016 much to the relief of her family
00:21:47
and friends 24 year old alice ruggles
00:21:50
had told harry dylan that she no longer
00:21:52
wanted to be in a relationship with him
00:21:55
she moves out of a house that she's been
00:21:58
sharing
00:21:59
housemates who've seen this decline in
00:22:01
her character she moves in with a friend
00:22:03
she's working for a media hub
00:22:06
in newcastle
00:22:07
and she moves in with someone who works
00:22:09
there and they have a ground floor flat
00:22:11
in gateshead
00:22:13
which they share
00:22:14
alice was trying to regain control of
00:22:17
her life
00:22:20
at this point dylan is very much of the
00:22:22
mindset i will get what i want i am
00:22:25
going to get alice back because she is
00:22:27
mine so he starts bombarding her with
00:22:30
phone calls
00:22:35
[Music]
00:22:49
what's going on here is this is a fully
00:22:51
grown adult man essentially having a
00:22:53
tantrum
00:22:54
you know drawing on these different
00:22:56
tactics out of desperation in the hope
00:22:59
that one of them is going to work
00:23:01
i don't even know if you're getting wise
00:23:03
mrs please can you call me back
00:23:05
thank you
00:23:09
dylan was relentless and bombarded alice
00:23:13
day and night
00:23:15
her phone was constantly pinging and and
00:23:18
it was always him
00:23:19
and
00:23:20
she wanted him to move on of course he
00:23:22
became the boyfriend who wouldn't go
00:23:23
away she wanted him to move on
00:23:26
but this isn't a guy who's love sick
00:23:28
who's missing his ex-girlfriend this is
00:23:31
somebody who's had something taken away
00:23:32
from him that he feels entitled to
00:23:37
alice blocked dylan's phone number
00:23:39
though she could still hear his
00:23:41
voicemails
00:23:42
and his particular technique was the
00:23:44
veiled threat so he'd never say i'm
00:23:46
going to do this to you he would say if
00:23:49
i was a bad guy i'd do this to you but
00:23:51
i'm not so i won't
00:23:53
it was always framed like that alice
00:23:55
tried to block dylan on facebook and
00:23:58
found that her account had been hacked
00:24:00
he was controlling her her social media
00:24:03
so he'd actually
00:24:05
um got control of her facebook account
00:24:08
i'm guessing she she left her phone or
00:24:11
laptop around um with it still switched
00:24:14
on so he took the password and and she
00:24:17
knew that he had the password and he
00:24:19
then um meant that he could control what
00:24:22
was on the account
00:24:23
monitoring and surveillance behaviors
00:24:25
are something we come across a lot in
00:24:27
cases like this and very often the
00:24:29
victim won't be aware of the fact that
00:24:32
the perpetrator is essentially spying on
00:24:34
them the availability of spyware and
00:24:37
this kind of technology is is really
00:24:40
quite widespread now dylan claimed to
00:24:43
have intimate photographs of alice and
00:24:45
threatened to release them on her social
00:24:47
media accounts
00:24:49
she had no idea what those photographs
00:24:51
were
00:24:52
and
00:24:54
she was really anxious about it
00:24:56
she didn't tell me about this till
00:24:58
quite a little while later because i
00:25:00
think she felt that it was some it was
00:25:02
embarrassing thing to talk about it's
00:25:04
embarrassing to talk to your mum about
00:25:05
it and i suspect she would have been
00:25:08
embarrassed to go to the police about it
00:25:10
and so that was perhaps the reason why
00:25:11
she didn't go to the police
00:25:14
needing a break alice went to visit her
00:25:16
sister in germany who introduced her to
00:25:19
a new man
00:25:22
she really liked him and they arranged
00:25:24
to meet soon back in england
00:25:26
the only people who knew about alice's
00:25:29
new friend was her family
00:25:32
nowhere on social media or anything was
00:25:34
was this mentioned
00:25:36
but of course
00:25:38
alice was whatsapping him and we knew
00:25:40
all about this in the family whatsapp
00:25:42
we had a a family whatsapp going so
00:25:45
wherever we all were in different
00:25:46
corners of the world even or whatever we
00:25:48
were always in communication so we knew
00:25:50
about this
00:25:51
alice was finally beginning to enjoy her
00:25:54
life again
00:25:56
she was reconciling friendships um she
00:25:59
was exploring a new relationship this
00:26:02
should have been the start of something
00:26:04
really good for her but unfortunately
00:26:06
dylan was not going to tolerate that
00:26:12
saturday the 1st of october 2016
00:26:16
alice was at home in her ground floor
00:26:18
apartment in gateshead
00:26:21
so alice was on her own in the flat and
00:26:22
then there's this knock on the front
00:26:23
door and when alice looks out of the
00:26:25
little peephole there's no one there
00:26:28
and obviously that's worrying and it
00:26:31
happened two or three times at intervals
00:26:33
during the course of the evening
00:26:35
and then she goes to bed and then after
00:26:37
she's gone to bed there's this knock on
00:26:39
the window right behind her bed
00:26:42
and when she opens the curtains he's
00:26:44
there he's jumped in over that wall and
00:26:46
he's left
00:26:47
flowers and chocolates on the windowsill
00:26:49
he's backing off as if to say
00:26:53
okay i'm going now
00:26:55
after leaving the flowers and chocolates
00:26:58
dylan left alice a chilling voicemail
00:27:02
he really loved alice he'd never ever
00:27:03
thought about killing her and he left
00:27:05
the flowers and chocolates there because
00:27:07
he didn't want to kill her
00:27:09
and and he kept mentioning killing her i
00:27:11
think it was about seven or eight times
00:27:14
in the conversation
00:27:15
this is is language which really does
00:27:18
set my radar off and alice is the best
00:27:21
judge of her level of risk so she knows
00:27:24
dylan incredibly well she knows that the
00:27:27
patterns of his behavior and this
00:27:30
incident is serious enough to have her
00:27:32
calling the police she really does feel
00:27:35
in danger at this point in time
00:27:39
hi there and i just need a bit of advice
00:27:42
really and more than anything i split up
00:27:45
with my boyfriend about three months ago
00:27:47
he's hacked into my facebook and also my
00:27:50
phone tonight he's
00:27:53
um
00:27:54
well i had a knock at my door
00:27:56
and well he sent me a message saying
00:27:58
i've been in the garden since five i had
00:28:00
to knock at my door and then and he's
00:28:03
come around the back knocked on my
00:28:05
bedroom window he's like left
00:28:08
um some flowers and chocolates my
00:28:10
friends have been telling me to call the
00:28:12
police well it's being noted the
00:28:13
incident number which is 59
00:28:16
59
00:28:18
brilliant thank you
00:28:22
[Music]
00:28:28
alice was comforted by the police
00:28:30
response and a police information notice
00:28:33
or pin was issued against dylan
00:28:36
in theory the pin would stop dylan from
00:28:39
approaching alice again
00:28:42
at the time alice thought
00:28:44
that that she was protected and so she
00:28:46
felt much better and for three or four
00:28:48
days after that
00:28:50
then um she went to work and and people
00:28:53
at skye said that she was was was
00:28:56
almost back to her old self and she was
00:28:58
happy again
00:29:00
[Music]
00:29:01
dylan is somebody to whom the rules
00:29:04
don't apply he thinks he's above the law
00:29:06
he's not going to be told by anybody
00:29:08
else what to do
00:29:09
and this is a characteristic that we see
00:29:12
a lot in abusers like him
00:29:14
four days after the pin had been issued
00:29:17
to dylan alice received a parcel
00:29:20
in the parcel were some personal items
00:29:22
of alice's and a letter from dylan
00:29:25
and he said uh you don't need to worry i
00:29:27
i um i will never come near you again um
00:29:31
i know you've got a new man
00:29:34
and
00:29:36
that was that in that last bit was
00:29:39
horrifying in itself because
00:29:42
alice had
00:29:44
met someone new about two or three weeks
00:29:46
earlier alice had gone to great lengths
00:29:49
to keep her new romance off social media
00:29:52
the only people who knew were her family
00:29:55
we believe he must have installed
00:29:57
software on her phone
00:29:59
um
00:30:00
spyware
00:30:02
um so that he was actually spying on the
00:30:04
whatsapp conversations which is a scary
00:30:07
thought looking back
00:30:08
um but we there was no other way he
00:30:11
could have known of the existence of her
00:30:13
new
00:30:14
boyfriend
00:30:15
alice called the police again hoping to
00:30:17
talk to the same officer who had
00:30:19
previously helped her but unfortunately
00:30:23
when alice phoned the police she got a
00:30:25
call back from somebody who was quite
00:30:27
unsympathetic
00:30:29
and they made alice feel that she was
00:30:31
making a fuss about nothing
00:30:33
and
00:30:34
they asked her if she wanted him
00:30:36
arresting
00:30:38
but unfortunately the way they asked it
00:30:40
was you know what you want us to do
00:30:42
about it arrest him
00:30:44
as if
00:30:45
it was the most ridiculous thing in the
00:30:47
world so alice said well well no i
00:30:50
suppose not
00:30:51
alice was completely deflated
00:30:56
alice um rang me and told me about this
00:30:59
second approach from the police
00:31:02
and she was so unhappy
00:31:04
because
00:31:05
she said you know she said on the phone
00:31:07
she said mom it's just never gonna stop
00:31:09
he is never ever gonna leave me alone
00:31:12
and uh
00:31:14
so difficult as a parent to know what to
00:31:17
say because i
00:31:19
really naively and stupidly just wanted
00:31:22
to make her feel better so i said well
00:31:24
yeah well alice if you just keep
00:31:26
ignoring him just keep ignoring him he
00:31:28
will eventually go away and leave you
00:31:30
alone october the 12th 2016.
00:31:36
alice's flatmate maxine mcgill came home
00:31:40
from work
00:31:41
she'd forgotten her keys but knew alice
00:31:44
was there
00:31:45
unable to get alice to answer the door
00:31:48
she climbed through an open window
00:31:56
please i'm just i've just come back to
00:31:57
my flight and the door was locked so
00:32:11
rolling roads
00:32:23
you're doing really well maxine
00:32:38
i don't know what to do
00:32:55
october the 12th 2016
00:32:58
alice ruggle's flatmate maxine had found
00:33:01
her lying motionless in the bathroom of
00:33:03
their flat in a pool of blood paramedics
00:33:07
pronounced 24 year old alice ruggles
00:33:09
dead as maxine had told the emergency
00:33:12
services in her opinion there was only
00:33:15
one suspect
00:33:16
maxine mcgill knew exactly what had
00:33:18
happened to alice
00:33:20
because she knew just how scared she was
00:33:22
of harry dylan
00:33:23
and just what he was capable of and that
00:33:25
999 call
00:33:27
haunting 999 call
00:33:29
of maxine
00:33:31
telling the police that her friend was
00:33:32
dead and telling them straight away
00:33:35
harry dylan has done it he's a
00:33:37
psychopath
00:33:39
senior forensic scientist michelle
00:33:41
walton was the lead scientist at the
00:33:43
crime scene
00:33:45
there was lots of blood staining within
00:33:47
the scene and
00:33:49
this painted a picture of what in my
00:33:51
opinion had happened to alice within
00:33:54
that room
00:33:56
in my opinion the distribution suggested
00:33:58
that she had been positioned
00:34:01
over the shower tree at the time she had
00:34:02
sustained the significant injury to her
00:34:04
throat
00:34:06
the distribution of blood within the
00:34:07
bathroom itself and on herself
00:34:10
would suggest that perhaps she'd
00:34:11
attempted to get to her feet having been
00:34:14
on her knees
00:34:15
but fundamentally she hadn't been
00:34:17
upright having sustained the injury to
00:34:19
her throat
00:34:21
before she came to rest in front of the
00:34:22
bathroom door
00:34:24
there was one man the police wanted to
00:34:26
question
00:34:27
within five hours trimming harry dylan
00:34:30
was apprehended at his barracks and
00:34:33
brought to the station in newcastle for
00:34:35
questioning
00:34:37
officers were also dispatched to alice's
00:34:40
parents home in leicestershire england
00:34:43
they
00:34:44
basically told us that the
00:34:47
alice was was dead
00:34:50
i think we immediately looked at each
00:34:52
other and said his name we knew
00:34:54
instantly who'd done it
00:34:56
i knew
00:34:58
that there was no way i could stand up
00:35:01
and let the policeman out
00:35:03
i just there's just no way i could stand
00:35:05
up because i just all the blood had
00:35:07
stopped circulating and i you know it's
00:35:10
just like the worst thing you could
00:35:11
possibly imagine
00:35:17
when dylan was first questioned by the
00:35:19
police he denied having made any contact
00:35:22
with alice that evening
00:35:25
at this point his objective is
00:35:26
self-preservation and he's just sitting
00:35:29
there he's keeping calm because i think
00:35:31
he is that arrogant that he thinks he's
00:35:32
got away with this
00:35:34
a few days before the murder
00:35:36
we discovered that he'd made a
00:35:38
reconnaissance trip down to newcastle
00:35:41
because we found a photograph on his
00:35:42
phone of the rear bathroom window at
00:35:46
alice's flat
00:35:48
he plainly been down to see how he might
00:35:50
be able to get into the property when
00:35:52
presented with cctv evidence that his
00:35:55
vehicle was seen traveling from
00:35:57
edinburgh to newcastle on the day of the
00:36:00
murder and that his mobile phone had
00:36:03
pinged off several mars along that route
00:36:05
his story changed
00:36:08
i drove down
00:36:10
towards newcastle and
00:36:13
because i was
00:36:15
i just i just wanted answers
00:36:18
so i drove down to speak to her
00:36:24
[Music]
00:36:26
he was then shown dash cam footage of
00:36:28
his vehicle parked near alice's
00:36:30
apartment within the time frame of the
00:36:32
murder he then stated it had all been an
00:36:35
accident which he would continue to
00:36:37
claim throughout
00:36:38
she'd accidentally stabbed herself
00:36:40
through the nose with the knife
00:36:43
she'd accidentally cut her own forehead
00:36:45
with the knife
00:36:46
and she'd accidentally
00:36:48
slashed her throat open at least six
00:36:51
times
00:36:52
causing that terrible and fatal
00:36:55
injury
00:36:56
when he's being interviewed
00:36:58
he is just kind of responding in the
00:37:00
moment and his stories don't stack up
00:37:03
that there's not evidence to support the
00:37:05
version of events that he's putting
00:37:07
across the evidence was mounting against
00:37:10
dylan the police now needed the forensic
00:37:13
evidence to place him in the bathroom
00:37:15
where alice was murdered
00:37:19
in terms of an offender they might often
00:37:22
discard the clothing that they're
00:37:23
wearing but they don't usually get rid
00:37:25
of things that are personal to them such
00:37:28
as watches jewelry or even footwear some
00:37:30
people might only have one pair of shoes
00:37:32
so we suggested that
00:37:34
if he had anything on him
00:37:36
such as jewelry or a watch or wool
00:37:38
glasses or his footwear then we could
00:37:40
examine those relatively quickly
00:37:43
he did actually have a helpful hero's
00:37:45
wristband and a silver bracelet that
00:37:48
were recovered from him at the time of
00:37:50
the arrest so these were fast-tracked to
00:37:52
the laboratory so there was a small
00:37:54
amount of blood that could be seen
00:37:55
microscopically
00:37:57
um it was caught in the recess of the
00:37:59
lettering
00:38:01
it was present in the o of the heroes
00:38:03
and the r of the organization part of
00:38:05
the wristband but there was only two
00:38:06
small blood stains present so they were
00:38:09
sampled onto a swab and then they were
00:38:11
sent for dna analysis and we were able
00:38:13
to obtain a profile that matched the dna
00:38:16
profile of alice ruggles
00:38:19
this placed dylan in the apartment and
00:38:22
in contact with alice's blood
00:38:24
a bloody fingerprint on the steering
00:38:26
wheel of his car was also a match to
00:38:29
alice
00:38:31
no murder weapon was found and alice's
00:38:33
phone was missing
00:38:35
at the time
00:38:37
i did not believe that he was capable of
00:38:39
doing what he did but if i knew
00:38:42
then
00:38:43
everything i know now about
00:38:46
stalking and controlling behavior
00:38:50
it was so obvious so that was what he
00:38:52
was going to do
00:38:53
within 36 hours on friday the 14th of
00:38:56
october the police had enough evidence
00:38:59
to charge dylan for the murder of alice
00:39:02
ruggles
00:39:05
april 2017
00:39:08
the trial of truman harry dylan for the
00:39:10
murder of alice ruggles was at newcastle
00:39:13
crown court
00:39:15
the case for the prosecution was
00:39:17
presented by richard wright qc
00:39:20
we could prove
00:39:22
that harry dylan had been inside the
00:39:24
flat with alice at the time that she
00:39:26
died
00:39:27
we could prove that he was obsessive
00:39:30
that he'd stalked her
00:39:32
[Music]
00:39:33
but we had to prove
00:39:35
that he'd also murdered her that is he
00:39:38
had caused those terrible injuries
00:39:41
we all react in different ways
00:39:44
so i think some some of us
00:39:46
had the anger
00:39:48
i never had that i think i was just
00:39:49
numbed
00:39:51
it's almost as if some part of the time
00:39:53
you're you're you almost feel as if
00:39:55
you're looking in on this and then then
00:39:57
you know in waves you realize no this is
00:40:00
really really happening to me and this
00:40:02
this guy is really
00:40:03
he's just killed our daughter and he's
00:40:05
just standing there in front of us
00:40:09
well the story that he gave at trial was
00:40:12
quite incredible
00:40:14
he said that having got into her flat
00:40:18
she was terrified and that she had armed
00:40:21
herself with a knife
00:40:23
that he had simply been trying to
00:40:25
calm her down and remove the knife from
00:40:28
her
00:40:30
and he gave this story that she had
00:40:32
inflicted all of these injuries on
00:40:34
herself accidentally with the knife
00:40:39
what i hadn't been prepared for was the
00:40:41
fact that he was trying to be
00:40:43
controlling even in that courtroom
00:40:46
and
00:40:48
he basically presented his version of
00:40:51
events it just kept coming back to me
00:40:53
what alice had said to me
00:40:55
he doesn't know what the truth is
00:40:57
and
00:40:58
you know he was he was changing his
00:41:00
story
00:41:02
every time a little bit of different
00:41:03
evidence came up his story changed to
00:41:06
try and
00:41:07
accommodate that evidence and it was all
00:41:11
it's complete nonsense
00:41:13
even at one point as he was describing
00:41:15
alice bleeding to death on the bathroom
00:41:18
floor
00:41:19
he turned to the public gallery in a
00:41:20
moment i'll never forget
00:41:23
looked alice's dad
00:41:24
straight in the eyes
00:41:27
and said to him
00:41:30
that it was a shame he couldn't protect
00:41:31
his daughter
00:41:36
i mean he tried to claim that alice's
00:41:38
dying words were that she hated her
00:41:40
sister which
00:41:42
was just
00:41:43
completely
00:41:46
weird i i just don't
00:41:48
i just don't understand how anyone could
00:41:50
be so evil
00:41:52
and horrible
00:41:55
within two hours dylan was convicted
00:41:57
unanimously by the jury for the murder
00:42:00
of alice ruggles at her home in
00:42:02
gateshead on the evening of october the
00:42:05
12th 2016.
00:42:09
i don't think the verdict really
00:42:10
mattered to harry dylan
00:42:12
what mattered to him was that he'd had
00:42:14
the stage
00:42:16
he'd had two or three weeks when the
00:42:18
whole world was focused on him which was
00:42:20
something that he loved
00:42:23
[Music]
00:42:24
truman harry dylan was sentenced to life
00:42:27
in prison to serve a minimum of 22 years
00:42:31
a further 10-year tariff would have been
00:42:33
added but the judge dismissed that the
00:42:36
murder was premeditated because it
00:42:38
didn't appear that dylan had arrived at
00:42:40
alice's apartment with a knife he has
00:42:43
been given
00:42:44
you know
00:42:45
the the sentence he deserved in law
00:42:48
um
00:42:49
but of course for us we have a a a life
00:42:52
sentence because um alice will never be
00:42:55
back with us
00:42:56
dylan appealed the sentencing decision
00:42:59
which was never brought before the court
00:43:02
and finally abandoned
00:43:06
since losing alice sue clive and their
00:43:09
family have set up the alice ruggles
00:43:11
trust and dedicated their lives to
00:43:14
raising the awareness of and putting an
00:43:16
end to stalking i feel that we've got to
00:43:20
raise a generation
00:43:22
in 10 or 15 years time when today's
00:43:25
teenagers tomorrow's young professionals
00:43:28
and tomorrow's young society we need to
00:43:30
raise a generation for whom
00:43:32
mention of the word stalking shocked
00:43:35
and shocks people and we've got to bring
00:43:37
about that change
00:43:38
the police later apologized admitting
00:43:41
lessons have been learned everybody who
00:43:44
alice had asked for advice felt i could
00:43:46
have made better advice i could have
00:43:47
done this differently
00:43:49
and i think
00:43:50
you know it is
00:43:52
it's a sort of common grief reaction
00:43:54
that you know i wish i had had done
00:43:56
things differently but i think for all
00:43:58
of ours
00:44:00
we could have done things differently
00:44:02
and if we'd spotted that stalking
00:44:03
earlier
00:44:04
could have kept alex alive and i think
00:44:07
you know you we're never gonna
00:44:09
we're never gonna recover from that
00:44:10
because
00:44:12
it would have made a difference
00:44:15
truman harry dylan terrorized alice
00:44:18
ruggles to fulfill his own twisted
00:44:20
misogynistic ego
00:44:23
he believed he could have any woman he
00:44:25
wanted and that women should worship him
00:44:28
and be flattered to receive his
00:44:29
attention he took the life of alice
00:44:32
ruggles because she had the audacity to
00:44:35
say no to him
00:44:36
making truman harry dylan one of the
00:44:39
world's most evil killers
00:44:43
[Music]
00:45:04
[Music]
00:45:30
you
