'My Online Date Beat me to a Pulp

AFRIK UPDATE

By Martha De Lacey 

Mother-of-two warns against internet dating after 'perfect gentleman' fractures her cheekbone.

A mother-of-two has warned against the dangers of internet dating after being beaten up by a salesman just weeks after meeting him online.

Birmingham Airport worker Susan Hulbert, 31, from Chelmsley Wood, also blasted magistrates after her attacker Gavin Taylor, 34, from Telford, Shropshire, walked free from court and was ordered to pay just £125 in compensation.

Pretty Miss Hulbert met Taylor, a high-flying salesman who claimed to be a former policeman, on popular dating website plentyoffish.com last December.

But he went from being a perfect gentlemen to a brutal thug when he launched a violent attack on terrified Miss Hulbert, breaking her cheekbone and leaving her hospitalised.

Now Taylor, 34, has been sentenced to a two-year community order at court and given a restraining order, banning him from contacting Susan or entering Chelmsley Wood.

The airport worker has now spoken out to warn other women about Taylor and the perils of internet dating.

Miss Hulbert said: 'Gavin was so clever. He treated me like a princess, I thought I knew him and it turns out I never really knew him.

'You don't know who you're meeting, they could be anybody. I'll never use a dating site again.'

Miss Hulbert was contacted by Taylor, from Telford, soon after joining the free plentyoffish.com website.

'I started talking to Gavin pretty much straight away and he seemed quite normal,' she said. 'When you have someone being normal on there, you notice them.'

After texting each other every day, the pair eventually met on a Sunday afternoon in a Solihull pub in the West Midlands on 20 February.
Miss Hulbert said: 'When we met he seemed nice. We didn't kiss on the first date and I thought he was a gentleman for that.'

The couple started 'seeing' each other properly, bu Miss Hulbert began to feel a creeping suspicion that the salesman wasn't the prince charming he appeared.

'He would get really angry with things, the police especially, but never with me,' she said. He plays bowls and I went to watch him play a match and I was getting scared with how angry he was getting.'

The mask finally slipped on April 21 while Miss Hulbert was staying at her new boyfriend's Telford home in Shropshire.

She quizzed him on why he was still receiving messages from the dating website and texts from an unknown person - and he exploded in rage.
'He hit my head against the wall, and I slipped down and started crying,' Miss Hulbert said. 'He started punching me in my face. I had bruises all over my hands and face from where I tried to protect myself.'

Terrified, she ran outside but was grabbed again by Taylor, who began dragging her back to the house. Mercifully, a neighbour heard her screams and called the police.

She was taken to hospital with a fractured cheekbone, large bumps to the head and bruising across her face and body. 

Today, although the physical injuries are beginning to heal, the mental scars are as strong as ever.