Louisa has spent far too long trying to escape the reach of her stalker and abuser.
She’s done everything right, including moving home, working with police and providing significant testimony in court.
And yet, the legal system consistently ignores her very real fear of being killed – instead deciding he mustn’t spend too long in jail because he might be inconvenienced.
Gerard Henderson has subjected many women to years of torment, including shooting a partner.
He has spent more than a decade in and out of jail for abusing and stalking different women.
The last set of offences happened two days after he was released from prison – TWO DAYS!
Henderson was sentenced this week in Colac after pleading guilty to stalking and persistently contravening a family violence intervention order.
The Magistrate gave this dangerous thug 12 months in prison, but with time served, he will be released in six months.
Louisa told the court she lived in a constant state of ‘recurring terror and fear’ and that courts had consistently refused to take in her suffering and trauma.
She allowed me to share her words and her photo so she can try to warn other women about this abuser – who trawls for partners on dating apps – and because she wants everyone to know how flawed the legal system is.
“I’m broken. They have given someone that is so crazy and dangerous this sentence,” she says.
“I have not stopped crying.
“He is a perpetrator and always will be. “I am so lost, exhausted and broken – the system that’s there to protect me is protecting him.
“It’s giving him time to get out and live his life and be with his family and I’m the one they have to relocate for a year.”
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