Hoax caller Jacqueline Hustler is spared jail (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Low Moor, Bradford, woman suffering from personality difficulties made claims because she felt ‘so lonely’

10:11am Friday 8th July 2011 in Low Moor By Tanya O'Rourke

A woman who made more than 200 hoax calls, causing “massive alarm” and a “monumental” waste of police time, has been sentenced.

Jacqueline Hustler, 43, who is blind and deaf, admitted at a previous hearing to making the calls to West Yorkshire Police, the Batley Enterprise Centre and Dewsbury District Hospital.

Bradford Crown Court was told yesterday Hustler, whose sentencing had been adjourned for the preparation of psychiatric reports, also suffers from “personality difficulties”.

Prosecutor Abigail Langford told the court Hustler, of Moorgate Avenue, Bradford Moor, made the calls between July 2009 and July 2010.

She had made several claims including that she had been raped, that she was going to stab people at Batley Enterprise Centre and a bomb had been left there, and she told a switchboard operator at the Dewsbury hospital that she had left a baby outside the accident and emergency department.

Recorder Henry Prosser told Hustler he was taking a “wholly exceptional course” in her case and that her difficulties meant her own responsibility for her behaviour was “significantly reduced”.

Sentencing her to a two-year community order with supervision for two years, he said had it not been for her personal problems he would have considered sending her to jail for longer than three years.

He said: “These are very serious offences indeed.

“They involved false allegations of rape which can cause a multitude of problems, sometimes to people who are falsely accused and cause a monumental waste of police time.

“There were bomb threats to Bradford Enterprise Centre and they again cause the most terrible waste of resources and they cause massive alarm.

“And then to complete the trio of false phone calls, you were making calls to Dewsbury Hospital about a baby being left outside a hospital.”

• Read the full story Friday’s T&A