Elderly man in clear on stalking

AN elderly Serbian man has been given a two-year restraining order after being acquitted of stalking a woman he did not know for more than 15 years.

In Southport Magistrates Court yesterday, the woman alleged Andjel Dobrosavijevic, 73, stood outside several restaurants where she worked in Surfers Paradise and watched her on a regular basis between noon and 3pm for about four years in the early 2000s.

She also claimed several times in the next decade he would follow her when she caught public transport and tracked her down when she began working at a clothing store at Australia Fair.

It was there in 2016 she claimed Dobrosavijevic attempted to grab hold of her, give her money and ask for sex.

However, after hearing the woman never told the man to leave her alone, Magistrate Joan White yesterday found Dobrosavijevic not guilty of one count of unlawful stalking from 2001-16.

Ms White found it was impossible to prove beyond reasonable doubt Dobrosavijevic had stalked the woman.

She said the woman had worked in a shop and the man was entitled to come in to buy items if he wished. Dobrosavijevic told the court he had been shopping at the time the woman filmed him.

The court found the period of time Dobrosavijevic was accused of stalking her as she worked in Surfers Paradise involved him “looking at her” from outside where he played chess with his friends in Cavill Mall.

The woman said it was other waitresses who told her the man was a “pervert” and “rude”. She claimed Dobrosavijevic told her he “missed her” and wanted to have sex with her when he tracked her down at the Australia Fair store.

She also claimed he ate an ice cream cone in a “sexually suggestive way” in front of her and said she was a “naughty girl” when the woman made a video recording of him.

Ms White found videos and photographs the woman had taken did not prove Dobrosavijevic had propositioned her for sex or that she had told him not to visit her at the store.

The woman gave evidence she told Dobrosavijevic she was “happily married” but not that she had ever asked him to leave her alone. “I was very humiliated and intimidated,” she told the court.

When Dobrosavijevic gave evidence he claimed the woman’s allegations were “100 per cent bullshit”.

Despite the acquittal, Ms White said it was clear the man had made the woman feel “unsafe” and a restraining order was made against Dobrosavijevic, meaning he cannot approach her for two years.