If the law actually worked, Joshua Stimpson wouldn’t have been able to stab Molly McLaren 75 times in broad daylight

A joint report by the Inspectorate of Constabulary and the CPS released last July looked at 112 cases of stalking and found that not one of them had been dealt with properly

Molly McLaren was stabbed 75 times by her ex-boyfriend Joshua Stimson (PA)

Molly McLaren was scared of Joshua Stimpson. She was right to be.

On 17 June last year, she ended their seven month relationship, telling friends that she felt she was “constantly treading on egg shells” around him.

Five days later, she was in North Kent police station, reporting his alarming behaviour towards her, which included derogatory Facebook comments. “He’s literally lost the plot. I was worried he was going to turn up at my house,” she told friends. “I’m actually scared of what he might do to me.”

A police officer rang Stimpson and put him on speaker phone in front of McClaren. “We wouldn’t want Molly to come to the police station again about you, would we?” said the officer. “Wouldn’t we?” replied Stimpson.

One week after that, Stimpson followed the 23-year-old into her gym in Chatham, setting up his exercise mat beside her. “Mum he’s turned up at the gym and come next to me,” she texted.

Then he followed her out to her car, where he stabbed her 75 times.

Yesterday, he was jailed for her murder.

Stimpson had denied murder on the grounds of diminished responsibility, arguing that his mother leaving the family when he was a teenager had left him with a pathological fear of abandonment. (Funny, isn’t it, how many people manage to go through parental break-ups and not later terrorise then cold-bloodedly kill their ex). The problem with that claim, as the court heard, was that his actions were clearly planned. He went shopping for the weapons he used to kill her before the attack. He pursued her constantly.

He had done this before, stalking two of his previous girlfriends.

Yet Kent Police were unable to protect McLaren from a man who was unambiguously menacing her – either because they lacked the powers to do so, or because they didn’t use the powers they had. The service has reported itself to the Independent Office for Police Conduct over the murder: if it’s found to have failed, it won’t be alone. A joint report by the Inspectorate of Constabulary and the Crown Prosecution Service released last July looked at 112 cases of stalking and found that not one of them had been dealt with properly.

If the police aren’t doing their job, then nothing victims do is going to help. McClaren took all the steps women are always told to take. She broke up with the controlling boyfriend, clearly and publicly. (Of course, he didn’t like that, and told her she could have done it in a “more respectful” way. As if there could be a right way to finish with a man who thinks he owns your life.) She reported his abuse to Facebook. (Facebook reportedly did not act.) She reported him to the police.

It’s not enough. Women won’t be safe from men like Stimpson as long as there’s a failure to see the patterns in femicide. The controlling behaviour that escalates. The obsession that feeds on itself until vicious thoughts become violent intent.

And as we’ve seen from previous cases, men can do worse than stalking and be given the freedom to do it again. In January this year, Theodore Johnson was convicted of murdering Angela Best after she tried to leave him – he had killed two of his previous partners.

Even when these possessive patterns of behaviour don’t end up in murder, they ruin women’s lives. If the aim of the abusive man is to control the woman, then as soon as he’s got into her head, he’s won. When she’s forever fearful that she’s right behind him. When she knows that he will devote all his energies to slating her to anyone he can. When she knows that ending the relationship is never going to make it “over” as far as he’s concerned – then he’s got what he wants.

Stalking victims lose their liberty, while their stalkers are free to pursue them. The law is beginning to recognise the severity of this kind of behaviour, but action is not coming fast enough. For the Stimpsons and Johnsons of the world, women exist to be owned; and when they defy ownership, they exist to be punished. If such men ever doubt themselves, they can look to movies and media and (of course) pornography for reassurance that women are property to be claimed or destroyed. The law needs to insist otherwise. The law needs to insist that women’s freedom from fear comes first.