St Kilda bar worker who set up fake Instagram accounts to stalk a woman who rejected him gets 10 months in jail
A barman who bombarded a woman he tried to pick up with “sadistic” messages from fake Instagram accounts has been jailed.
South East
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A barman who bombarded a woman he tried to pick up with “sadistic” messages from fake Instagram accounts is now serving time.
Mark Riley was jailed for stalking the victim after he met her in the St Kilda bar he was working at.
The 21-year-old woman, a dancer and social media influencer, rebuffed his advances although remained friendly towards him, exchanging messages about innocent topics such as food.
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But Riley wanted more than a platonic relationship.
He set up fake Instagram accounts, sent her dozens of messages containing her personal details and suggested he had compromising videos of her that he was going to send to police and her family.
On February 6 she received 12 private messages which contained family members’ names, her Medicare and bank card numbers and employment details, and included claims he had a video of her using a sex toy.
The day after he sent 20 more messages, this time from another fake account, including one which stated he was going to send a very intimate video of her to her mother.
The woman felt unsafe in her own home and was so “traumatised, fearful and anxious” because of his “sadistic” behaviour that she moved house and stopped working.
Instagram later tracked down the fake profiles to an East Melbourne apartment where Riley was staying, and he was arrested.
The 33-year-old pleaded guilty to one charge of stalking at the County Court in Ballarat on January 30.
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Judge Frank Gucciardo said he showed “immaturity, selfishness and lack of control”.
“Stalking is an offence which has profound impact upon victims of it,” Judge Gucciardo said.
“It is a sadly prevalent and pernicious offence which has aspects of cruelty and meanness, clearly lacking in any empathy for the subject but focused on the perverse pleasure gained often, as indeed in this case, out of a sense of rejection or entitlement or to punish a rebuff for a relationship which, in your own mind, was on foot, which you had desired but which was not reciprocated at all by the complainant.”
Riley has a long rap sheet in both Queensland and Victoria, and was on bail for theft and deception crimes when he sent the vile messages.
He was sentenced to a total of 10 months’ jail, and will be eligible for parole in June.
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