A TEENAGER who had initially been “lovely” towards his new girlfriend after they met on a dating website bombarded her with threatening messages after she got drunk. 

Over two days, 18-year-old William Cowell sent her abusive messages, threatening to burn down her house and vowing to “stamp all over her head,” Carlisle’s Rickergate court heard.

The defendant, of Currock Road, Carlisle, admitted an offence under the Malicious Communications Act – sending threatening messages between March 17 and 19. 

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Pam Ward, prosecuting, said the victim started a relationship with Cowell on February 16 after contacting him through the dating website Tinder. She told police: “He was lovely to start with; I couldn’t fault him.”

But his attitude changed, said the woman, in March after an occasion when she got drunk during a night out with friends. He told her that he had recently left prison for a robbery but she concluded that this was perhaps “not as bad as it could have been.”

She reasoned that he could have gone to prison for "worse offences. 

Mrs Ward went on to outline the details of the threatening messages sent by the teenager, whose past convictions included both the robbery and an offence of possessing indecent child photos.

In her account, said the prosecutor, the victim had explained how she had told Cowell that she was planning to go out with friends for drinks and he responded by telling her she could not go out. “I told  him that I would go out,” said the woman.

He told her not to get drunk. Cowell insisted she must be home by 11pm but she told him she planned to be home by midnight. This triggered a spate of messages from Cowell.

In these, he called her a series of upsetting names.

It was at this point that he threatened to burn down her house. He then made a series of abusive phone calls, prompting her to repeatedly hang up on him. The victim said: “I messaged him, asking him to leave me alone. He called me and said he’d stamp all over my head.

The woman said she was scared because Cowell had been to her home and knew that her family lived there.

She said: “He knew where I lived...and said I would go to the police.” Despite being told that, the teenager’s response was to send the woman yet more abusive messages. Those messages included a threat to slit the victim’s mum’s throat.

When the victim told Cowell their relationship was over, and that she had told her sister what he had done, he pleaded with her to let it drop, saying he had an appointment with his probation officer.

Andrew Gurney, defending, described Cowell as a “troubled young man.”

“He found himself in a relationship that had ended abruptly,” said the lawyer. “Showing signs of his immaturity, he lashed out. They were not nice things to say but he says that they were not threats that in any way he would carry out.

“They were things he said in the heat of the moment.”

Mr Gurney said that Cowell had not enjoyed the best start in life, having been brought up in local authority care and having been diagnosed with a severe form of ADHD, which hindered his ability to regulate his emotions.

This made him prone to outbursts, said the lawyer.

Magistrates said that the victim had been vulnerable but they did not feel that the offence had crossed the custody threshold. Nor was it appropriate to impose a fine given that the defendant – appearing via a video link – was currently in custody.

They imposed a one-year conditional discharge, which means Cowell will not be punished if he stays out of trouble for that period.

Magistrates also imposed a one-year restraining order, banning any contact with the victim. Cowell is banned from entering the street in Penrith where she lives.