The Terror of Stalking

This story was cut from my book Tightrope. With so many experiences I had to find a way to shorten the book (editor advice). But it’s important enough that I wanted to share it here.

Over the course of my policing career, I investigated a number of stalking cases. In most of them, it was men stalking women after a relationship ended. Sometimes the couples had been married, sometimes they hadn’t. But the pattern was always the same: one person refused to accept that the relationship was over.

These cases were difficult to move forward in the justice system. Breakups come with tangled circumstances, shared children, assets, unfinished conversations. That ambiguity can mask danger. But I always took these files seriously. Not just because of the documented risk of assault, serious harm, or death but because I knew what it felt like to be watched, followed, and monitored against my will.

When I was a new police officer, I was stalked.

And the person who stalked me was another police officer, from a neighbouring agency.

From our very first interaction, something felt wrong. I was speaking with a sex trade worker,  a woman I had come to know through regular conversations. I didn’t “move women along,” the way many officers were trained to do at that time. I listened. I learned their stories. Many of these women trusted me enough to share information that mattered about violence, drug trafficking, and firearms circulating on the street.

As I was talking with her, a male officer pulled up to “provide backup.” Backup itself wasn’t unusual  but coming from an officer working completely outside the area I was in was. Still, I thanked him.

But I noticed something else: the woman I was speaking with closed up. Her expression changed. She went quiet in a way I had learned to recognize, fear disguised as stillness.

Later that night, she told me why.

This officer was “known” on the street. Known for being aggressive. Known for being intimidating. Known for being gross. She told me that he once made a comment suggesting that a sex trade worker must have bled when she was raped by her stepfather as a child.

As she spoke, I felt my mouth fill with water the feeling you get just before you throw up. I remember thinking:

How has this behaviour gone unreported? How is this man a police officer?

And then the stalking began.

He showed up everywhere I went. Not just along the border between jurisdictions. Deep into my city. I couldn’t understand how he always knew where I was. Was he monitoring my police radio channel?

One night, as I sat in my patrol car working on my mobile terminal, a message from him suddenly appeared. My stomach dropped. He should not have had that access.

I called dispatch to ask how he had reached me. I learned he had phoned my dispatcher and asked for my specific workstation ID, the direct messaging number to my computer,  and the dispatcher provided it because he claimed he needed to speak with me about an investigation.

That was a lie.

I began typing a message back to confront him when he pulled up right next to my vehicle.

I told him, very clearly, that I was uncomfortable with the level of contact he was making and that I was not interested in any relationship.

But he continued showing up. Always with a justification. Always with a smile that felt off.

Eventually, I went to my Sergeant and Staff Sergeant. I told them everything. They took it seriously. They spoke to the rest of my watch which was mostly men and they stepped up immediately.

When I was dispatched to random calls, they started showing up too. They would arrive before he could get to me. And when they saw him approaching, they would tell him to leave.

They protected me.

My Staff Sergeant contacted his supervisor and explained what was happening. His supervisor assured us the officer would be told to stop.

And he did.

I was lucky.

Years later, I saw a news story. That same officer had been arrested for assaulting a woman. He was not fired.

I felt cold to my core. I thought about my instincts. The warning signs. The way my body reacted when he was near. And I wondered how many women had suffered because his behaviour had been minimized, ignored, or dismissed.

What came out during that investigation was that his personnel file already contained numerous complaints from women he had encountered on duty. I remember feeling relieved that he was gone but also deeply unsettled.

Should I have done more? Could I have?

That experience shaped how I approached stalking and domestic violence cases for the rest of my career. I understood the subtlety. The difficulty in explaining “a feeling.” The way fear can live in the gut before it ever shows up on paper.

Women know.

We know when something is off.

We know when danger is circling.

We know when we’re not safe.

So I listened.

I believed them.

I built safety plans into every file regardless of how “minor” it seemed.I refused to treat stalking as a misunderstanding or “relationship drama.”

And whenever I found myself pushing past the traditional boundaries of policing, stretching procedures, or challenging the status quo it was because some part of me remembered what it felt like to be watched.

If you are experiencing this now please reach out.

Tell someone.

Tell law enforcement.

Tell your family.

Tell your employer.

Do not minimize your fear. You deserve safety.

If you know someone going through this, believe them, support them, make sure you don’t let them explain away behavior. Encourage them to report and take action.

I am grateful my story ended the way it did. I know many others do not and I know people personally who have experienced losing a loved one to domestic violence and stalking behavior.

Please take any woman’s or man’s concern about stalking seriously.

Lives often depend on it.