Wedding planner who sent herself threatening letters in bid to frame ex-husband for stalking jailed

A wedding planner who sent herself threatening letters and made false statements to the police in a bid to frame her ex-husband for stalking has been jailed for two years. 

Lincoln County Court heard that Emma Heys acted with ‘malice’, making so many false allegations against her ex-partner Christopher Heys that the police gave the investigation a codename – ‘Operation Franklin’. 

The 42-year-old also submitted false statements to a county court in an attempt to secure a non-molestation order against Mr Heys, claiming to have been the victim of domestic violence on numerous occasions. 

Neil Sands, prosecuting, said Heys was aware that any breaches of that order would lead to the arrest of her former husband. 

The court heard that Mr Heys met his future wife in Manchester in 2006, and later moved to Lincoln in 2013 where Heys ran a wedding planning business. 

Mr Heys described their relationship as ‘volatile’ and left his wife on Boxing Day, 2018, the court heard. 

Mr Sands said Heys contacted a solicitor in February 2019 and applied to Lincoln County Court for a non-molestation order against her former husband, in which she claimed to be the victim. 

She claimed to have received a bunch of dead-headed flowers on Valentine’s Day in 2019, to have been stalked by Mr Heys at her stall on Lincoln Christmas Market and to have received a number of threatening and abusive letters. 

Mr Heys, who is disabled, was arrested three times between February and March 2019 over alleged breaches of the order, including one occasion when he was transported from his address in Wigan, Greater Manchester, to Lincoln in the back of a caged police van. 

After being arrested for a third time, he asked for checks to be made on ANPR traffic cameras, bank records and with friends to prove he had not travelled to Lincoln on the days that allegations were made by his ex-wife. 

In total, Heys made 15 false statements to the police. 

Mr Sands told the court: ‘Everything he put forward proved to be correct. 

‘The main victim in this case, Christopher Heys, had his name besmirched and his life was in turmoil and turned upside down for several months’. 

The 42-year-old submitted false statements to a county court in an attempt to secure a non-molestation order against Mr Heys, claiming to have been the victim of domestic violence on numerous occasions

In a victim impact statement, Mr Heys said one of the arrests happened at his daughter’s home, and involved five police officers. 

Mr Sands added that Mr Heys ‘knew he had done nothing wrong’, and said that he suffered from mobility issues, which made the two hour journey in a police van from Wigan to Lincoln extremely uncomfortable. 

Siward James-Moore, mitigating, said a psychological report prepared for the case showed there was clear evidence of a woman struggling to cope and with depression.

He argued the relationship was also ‘tempestuous.’

‘It was not a scheme dreamed up to get a doting husband, the love of her life.’ Mr Siward-Moore said. ‘This was not a good relationship.’

Heys, of Lincoln, pleaded guilty to three charges of doing acts intended to pervert the course of public justice between January and July 2019. She was jailed for 28 months, and had no previous convictions. 

Passing sentence, Recorder Eugene Egan told Heys the impact on her ex-husband was substantial, and both police resources and domestic violence victims will have been affected by her actions.  

‘You deliberately lied to obtain a non-molestation order, to prove breaches of that order and to secure an extension of a non-molestation order’, the judge told her. 

‘The person whose life was traumatised by your lies was your ex-husband’.

The judge also told Heys it was within her gift to stop the ‘miserable existence’ inflicted on ex-husband, but ‘you went on and on.’

The Recorder concluded she was motivated by ‘malice’ towards her ex-husband, and said he completely rejected that she was a victim of domestic violence.