Vogue model held hostage by jealous boyfriend, court told
A SCOTS model was held hostage then dragged along the floor after she dumped her jealous boyfriend, a trial has heard.
Elaine Ford claims she was forced to shut herself in a bathroom after she told Nathan Gray their short fling was over.
Miss Ford, who has appeared in Vogue magazine, said Gray then carried out a stalking campaign – breaking into her flat, getting into her car uninvited and following her as she went Christmas shopping.
The 28-year-old also claims her ex stole her house keys, laptop and handbag and bombarded her with hundreds of phone calls and messages in the months following their split in November 2013.
Miss Ford, from Stirling, met Gray, 27, while both were studying at Edinburgh University. The pair became lovers but broke up, she said, after he went through her private emails and texts.
She told Edinburgh Sheriff Court Gray was jealous of her friends and didn’t like her doing ‘certain’ photoshoots.
The biology graduate, who is signed to Scottish agency Superior Model Management, described how Gray, from Weymouth, Dorset, held her captive at her student flat in Marchmont, Edinburgh.
She said: ‘He was angry and shaking and his face was really red. It seemed he had flipped out.’
He sat in front of her bedroom door and refused to let her leave. The model then claims she was pushed against a wall and dragged along the floor as she tried to stop him stealing her belongings. She ran to the en-suite bathroom.
‘He tore the handle off the door and was banging on the door. He was not being rational and had completely lost control,’ she said.
It was an hour before Gray eventually allowed her to leave, she said.
Gray, an engineering systems analyst, denies abducting Miss Ford by detaining her and denies stealing her belongings.
He also denies engaging in a course of conduct which caused Miss Ford fear and alarm by entering her home uninvited and refusing to leave, repeatedly contacting friends and family and repeatedly following her.
The trial in front of Sheriff Alistair Noble continues next week.