Shaw's stalker could face jail term
TV actor Martin Shaw said justice had been done after his "stalker" was found guilty of a five-year campaign of harassment.
Sandra Price sent a series of "offensive" and "intrusive" letters to Shaw - the star of Judge John Deed and The Professionals.
The 66-year-old, of Hingham, Norfolk, could face jail after being found guilty of harassing Shaw, 63, and his partner, Karen da Silva, between January 2003 and July 2008.
King's Lynn Magistrates Court heard Price regularly sat in her car parked outside Shaw's 17th century home in Hingham and often walked past. And in July last year, Price poured petrol through the letterbox of Ms da Silva's home in Hingham.
District Judge Tim Daber ruled this was part of a prolonged campaign of harassment against Shaw and Ms da Silva. "I'm quite satisfied that this was a part of a sustained course of conduct and not part of an isolated incident," said Judge Daber.
After the two-day hearing, Shaw spoke of his relief at the outcome. He said: "I am happy it's over. I thought it was conducted fairly and diligently on both sides. I think justice was done. I hope that this ends now and Mrs Price finds some peace."
The court heard Price sent a series of letters to Shaw following the break-up of his marriage offering to "heal" him. She also delivered a 45-minute audio tape to the actor's home and left a 120-page dossier detailing his career and her views about him on his doorstep.
Judge Daber said: "Mr Shaw describes the letters he received as offensive and intrusive and describes his feeling of insecurity as a result of the totality of Mrs Price's conduct."
Price admitted criminal damage following the incident in which Ms da Silva woke to find petrol in her hallway. She told the court she took the action after becoming angry that Ms da Silva had described her as Shaw's "stalker".
Judge Daber warned Price, who will be sentenced later this month, that she may go to prison. "At this stage I cannot rule out any sentencing option," he said.
-Nova
Big freeze causes sea to ice over
The sea froze as Britain's shivering start to the year got even colder.
Southern England, normally immune to the worst of the weather, was gripped by conditions colder than parts of Iceland and Greenland as temperatures fell close to minus 12C (10.4F).
In Dorset, the sub-zero temperatures froze a half-mile stretch along the shoreline of Sandbanks, home to Tottenham Hotspur manager Harry Redknapp.
Local people said it was the first time in decades the sea had partially frozen since 1991.
Across the country families ignored safety warnings and took to frozen flooded fields and lakes on ice skates.
Police in Ebbw Vale, south Wales, warned teenagers they are risking their lives by cycling across the frozen Festival Park lake, which is more than 20ft deep in some parts.
Residents in the nearby Rhondda Fach area were without normal water supplies for a second day because the cold snap has affected water pipes supplying Maerdy Water Treatment Works.
Welsh Water has apologised to customers and sent water bowsers to the area. It is also distributing water bottles to customers with special needs and parents with young babies.
Gareth Harvey, a forecaster for MeteoGroup UK, the weather division of the Press Association, said a combination of a front of freezing fog and black ice would make conditions for drivers even more perilous.
He said: "Southern England will still be coldest tonight but temperatures are unlikely to fall lower than minus 5C (23F). Fog patches will be freezing and there will still be a lot of ice. This is a dangerous combination."
-Nova
Parents appeal after arson death
A couple whose three-year-old daughter was murdered in an horrific arson attack have made a tearful plea for help to catch her killer.
Francesca Bimpson was treated in hospital for three weeks after being pulled from flames engulfing the bedroom of her Liverpool home.
But she died from extensive burns two days before Christmas. Her father Kieron Bimpson and mother Eleanor Skelhorne spoke of their devastation.
At a Merseyside Police press conference, Ms Skelhorne sobbed: "The safest place she should have been was her bed.
"The place where she should have felt most safe was her bed but she is not here.
"She has been burnt alive."
-Nova
Price speeding charge is dismissed
The case against glamour model Katie Price for an alleged speeding offence has been dropped in her absence due to a legal technicality.
The 30-year-old, best known as Jordan, was charged with breaking a 30mph speed limit in Brighton, East Sussex, on March 5.
The model, who was living in Ockley, Dorking, Surrey at the time, was also charged with failing to supply information about the driver before the cut-off date of April 9.
A trial was due to go ahead at Brighton Magistrates' Court after her barrister Katherine Hodson formally entered not guilty pleas on her behalf.
But David Packer, prosecuting, asked for an adjournment to allow the Crown extra time to prepare an audit trail of the main witness's evidence.
During the hearing, Ms Hodson said it would be unfair to her client to allow the prosecution further time to prepare their case when they had overlooked a point of law.
She told magistrates: "To adjourn the case is, in my submission, not in the interests of justice."
Chair of the bench Lady Anne Mogg formally dismissed the charges against Ms Price.
-Nova
