I THOUGHT HE'D COME TO KILL ME

For Sally Meeson, 45, the end of a relationship was the beginning of a nightmare

- SALLY MEESON

On a stifling hot summer night, I pushed open the sash windows of the Victorian house I shared with friends on a leafy road in west London, longing for ventilation to help us sleep. I wandered to my cosy room and drifted off surprisingly quickly. But it was a slumber that would be short-lived. Suddenly I was woken by shouting and screaming, and what sounded like a violent scuffle on the stairs. I was about to run and help, assuming an intruder had climbed through a window, until I heard my housemates yelling, 'Sally, stay in your room, it's him again!” Terrified, I pressed my ear to the door and heard a desperate, drunk voice moaning, 'I just want to talk to her. There was only one thought on my mind... He'd finally come to kill me.

I called 999, pleading with the operator to send help, insisting this was one of many calls I'd made and police already had records of the man currently held in a headlock on my stairs. After an agonisingly long wait, the police arrived, but he still wouldn't desist, forcing them to get heavy and forcefully sling him into one of many police vans sent to what police assumed could be a more sinister outcome. Then, me and my flatmates were taken into separate rooms by serious-faced officers, where we sat up giving statements until dawn.