Laura Woods harassed for two years by football fan who sent her STI kit in post
An award-winning sports presenter was harassed for two years by a female football fan who sent her unwanted deliveries including an STI testing kit.
Laura Woods, a presenter for ITV and TNT Sports, was left living in “real fear” during the campaign of harassment by Harneet Kaur, 25, who has now been jailed.
Liverpool fan Kaur called Ms Woods, 36, a prostitute in a series of vile messages, sent unwanted food deliveries to her home and added derogatory comments to her Wikipedia page.
Kaur, who went by the name “Krazy Harns” online, also arranged for a Bible and a sexual health testing kit to be sent to her house and threatened to kidnap and kill her dog.
According to the Daily Mail, Ms Woods said in her victim impact statement that the campaign of harassment, which began in June 2021 and lasted until September 2023, had an “enormous and devastating” effect on her.
Ms Woods travels all over the country for matches and interviews working for TNT Sports, formerly BT Sports, and was the lead presenter of ITV’s coverage of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
She was also named as Broadcast Sports Presenter of the Year for her coverage of the World Cup.
Prosecutors at Wolverhampton Crown Court said Kaur’s actions had left Ms Woods with a “real fear” that she would get close to her while she was working.
She has been forced to increase security at home and while at work and suffers from anxiety.
Kaur, who has autism, is already banned from Liverpool’s Anfield stadium for ticket touting and her barrister said that “obsession and compulsion” caused by her autism was behind her offending.
But judge Talog Davies, who jailed her for 14 months on Friday, said she would have known the impact she was having on Ms Woods.
Antonie Muller, prosecuting, said the campaign started in June 2021, when Kaur used Just Eat to arrange a delivery of Krispy Kreme doughnuts to the presenter’s home in London.
He said Ms Woods was initially pleasantly surprised and thought it was a mistake or somebody being nice” so she posted a picture on her Twitter account saying they had “made her evening”.
However, Mr Muller added: “She did not realise this was to be the start of a campaign against her.”
Harassment turned ‘much darker’
Ms Woods went on to receive a Just Eat order from Starbucks and a chocolate lollipop with a message saying “from your secret admirer and I’m not crazy”.
Mr Muller said the contact then “all turned much darker” and among a string of messages was one saying Ms Woods was a “former prostitute who slept herself into a job”.
Kaur’s iPad showed that in July that year she had visited the London road where Ms Woods lived while other messages posted online from an account linked to Kaur called Ms Woods a “vile, stuck-up person”.
After she was arrested on April 8, 2022, and her iPad and phone were seized, Kaur continued to leave derogatory comments on Ms Woods’ Wikipedia page and sent her a voice note on Instagram.
She also sent messages saying Ms Woods was “Tory” and was not welcome in Liverpool before a match in the city.
Kaur was arrested again in August 2022 and another iPhone was seized by police, but Mr Muller said “it didn’t stop her”.
In October she posted a message saying “wtf is that cokehead doing at Anfield” and a picture of the presenter’s face on the body of an overweight man.
Prosecutors sought to have Kaur banned from every football ground in the country, swathes of London and all of Newcastle, where Ms Woods’ boyfriend Adam Collard lives.
However the judge said it was too draconian and imposed a restraining order, banning her from contacting Ms Woods and 14 other people, or from going within 500m of the presenter’s home.
Balbir Singh, in mitigation, said: “This defendant has never met Laura Woods, she has never spoken to her, she has never approached her – this is why this case is very different to many others that come before the courts.”
He said Kaur had a “severe degree of autism which debilitated all aspects of her life” and she was not able to understand the impact on the TV presenter.
Kaur, who lives with her accountant parents in Walsall, admitted stalking at an earlier hearing.
Ms Woods has not commented on the case.
