Harassment Law

Harassment is when a person causes distress and/or alarm through their behaviour. Harassment includes actions taken and words spoken.

This behaviour must happen on more than one occasion for it to be deemed harassment. However, it does not have to be the same type of behaviour. For instance, it could be a phone call intended to cause you distress and a letter with the same intention. The individual incidents can happen months apart; they do not need to have happened within a specified time frame.

Under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, harassment is both a criminal and civil action. This means someone accused of harassment can be prosecuted in the criminal courts, yet also have action taken against them in the civil courts.

The civil court can make an order or injunction that the harasser must stop their behaviour. If they breach this injunction this then becomes a criminal offence, and the harasser can be prosecuted.

Harassment in a chat room or online is referred to as ‘cyber bullying’. In such a case the harassed should initially try to stop the harasser from being able to make contact, for example by blocking them or by reporting them to their provider. The harassed should try to keep evidence of online conversations, such as screenshots. If the bullying does not cease, the police should then be contacted.

The court will consider whether a reasonable person, with the same information that the accused has, would consider this behaviour harassment. Various forms of communication can constitute harassment, most commonly messages via social media, text or phone. It can also include loitering outside a person’s home, damage to property and acts of violence. The police may decide that they will not take any further legal action against the accused, and instead give him/her an informal harassment warning. If there are further reports in the future, the police may then take legal action. Should the matter proceed to court, the court may make a restraining order to protect the harassed, which can be made regardless of whether the accused is found guilty.