A jealous husband who bugged his wife’s car with a tracking device and spied on her home with “CCTV cameras in every room” has been spared prison – while his victim bravely recounts the years of ordeal that left her “looking like a scared little one”. ‘. girl.’
Christopher Bevan, 44, was paranoid that his wife Kath was having an affair and hounded her with FaceTime calls to prove she was alone and even used her FitBit to monitor her location, a court heard.
Bevan, of Pontarddulais, Swansea, pleaded guilty to coercive and controlling conduct and received a 12-month suspended sentence and a 10-year restraining order prohibiting him from contacting Kath.
He also had to take a ‘Building better relationships’ course and do 150 hours of unpaid work.
Christopher Bevan, 44, was paranoid that his wife Kath (pictured) was having an affair and hounded her with FaceTime calls to prove she was alone and even used her FitBit to track her location, a court heard
Bevan (pictured), of Pontarddulais, Swansea, pleaded guilty to coercive and controlling conduct and received a 12-month suspended sentence and a 10-year restraining order prohibiting him from contacting Kath
It came after police found a “significant number” of electronic devices to track his wife’s movements, including apps to track her phone movements, while the court heard how he would calling her repeatedly when she was at work.
The couple married in 2012, but separated eight years later after Kath finally had enough of her husband’s controlling behavior.
Prosecutor Dean Pulling said she was “mentally and physically exhausted” by the ordeal, which also left her “banned” from shopping alone.
Pulling said Bevan was arrested in November 2020 when police discovered the high-tech stalking. Swansea Crown Court learned that it was in March of the following year that Mrs Bevan’s brother discovered a tracking device on her car.
In a victim impact statement, Ms Bevan said she had felt “isolated, vulnerable, scared and alone” by her husband’s behaviour.
Helen Randall, defending herself, said Bevan accepted his behavior was unacceptable and could not be “explained or excused.”
Judge Catherine Richards told Bevan he used “multiple methods of control” over his wife that were “incredibly intrusive.”
Kath spoke out boldly after the trial, saying things went south after the birth of their son in 2017 and after they moved into their ‘forever home’.
Bevan used a Fitbit device to track the whereabouts of his wife, a court chief (stock image)
Prosecutor Dean Pulling said Kath (pictured) was left “mentally and physically exhausted” by the ordeal, which also left her “banned” from shopping alone
She said she started to feel like a “housekeeper and nanny” and “not a wife and mother” after Bevan developed a depression that worsened in 2018 and she received “no support or help” from him while doing housework.
Kath said allegations of an affair were tracked by a CCTV camera installed in the kitchen to keep an eye on her on the one day a week she worked from home.
She remembered wales online: “While I was working, I started getting ‘Find my iPhone’ notifications that I didn’t pay much attention to at the time.
“Then the harassment started with the countless calls a day.”
She said she would receive a “bombard of texts” until she answered, and that Bevan called her 50 times in 60 minutes one night while she was out with her friends.
Kath said she would be questioned up to four times a day on cases contrived by Bevan.
She added: ‘Then CCTV cameras appeared in every room of our house, including our bedroom and the nursery. The camera in our bedroom was pointed at me sleeping in bed, thinking I was contacting someone while he was sleeping.
“During the day he watched me change, get dressed and do general household chores in our bedroom. I was stripped of all privacy, not just in our bedroom but everywhere in our house.
“He even went so far as to ransack our bedroom looking for ‘evidence’ of an affair and locked the downstairs windows because he thought men were coming through.”
Kath said that since leaving Bevan she has become “a stronger person and, more importantly, a much happier person than I ever was”
Kath said that Bevan could read her WhatsApp messages on his PC and that he had a parenting app installed on her mobile phone, meaning he could monitor all of her texts, internet activities and social media usage.
She said she would no longer be able to access her social media accounts if Bevan thought she was on them too long, prompting her to ask his permission to log back in.
“That’s when I realized I wasn’t able to communicate with friends or family without him knowing,” Kath said, adding that she started walking face down for fear she’d make eye contact with someone and fuel her husband’s paranoia.
Friends then told her at her 40th birthday party that she looked like a “scared little girl who was supposed to sit still and not talk.”
Kath said that since she left Bevan, she has become “a stronger person and, more importantly, a much happier person than I ever was.”
She said she is “enjoying my new life” and “looking forward to what the future brings.”