‘Stalker sent Crown star explicit emails and harassed her at home’
THE Crown star Claire Foy called police after an alleged stalker sent offensive emails and repeatedly rang her doorbell, a court has heard.
Foy, 37, who played the young Queen in the first two series of the hit Netflix show, was allegedly targeted by Jason Penrose, 38, in November and December last year.
He sent explicit emails about “wanting her to be his girlfriend” to the actress’s publicist Emma Jackson, according to court papers.
Penrose also allegedly wrote on November 2: “I’m sorry I think Claire[sic] policy should be not talking about any personal stuff in media and only creative business.”
Ms Jackson sent the emails to Foy’s agent, who had also received messages but had blocked the sender.
Doorbell
On December 17 last year, Foy “called the police to report that Jason Penrose was outside her residence ringing on her doorbell constantly”, the court papers add.
Foy – who has won a Golden Globe, two Emmy Awards and two Screen Actors Guild Awards – starred in Steven Soderbergh’s psychological thriller film Unsane, and played lunar astronaut Neil Armstrong’s first wife Janet Shearon in the biopic First Man.
Kiera Oluwunmi represented the Metropolitan Police at Highbury Corner Magistrates’ Court in north London yesterday to request an interim stalking protection order (SPO) against Penrose.
Officers can apply at a magistrates’ court for a civil SPO to block alleged stalkers from contacting or approaching their alleged victims while a criminal investigation into their alleged
behaviour continues. Chairman of the bench Amanda Gibbon granted a temporary SPO.
Conditions ban Penrose from contacting Foy or Ms Jackson, as well as turning up at their homes, workplaces or anywhere they reasonably expect they would be.
Any breach of the order, which will remain in place until a hearing for a full order on June 30, can be prosecuted as a criminal offence.
Ms Gibbon said: “Bearing in mind the effects on the victims in this case and the extent to which the activity escalated, from a series of emails with particularly explicit content to a personal visit and staying in the area where one of the victims lives, and the effect this has had on the victims and their lifestyle, we consider it is appropriate to make the order.”
The court heard Penrose, whose address on court files is a hotel in Paddington, west London, had been sectioned.
He was not expected to attend but arrived later and the terms of the order were explained to him outside court.