‘There’s a hole dug for you': What boyfriend told young mother after kidnapping her, stripping her naked and tying her to a tree – all because she asked to spend the night alone
- Sophie Lazell was dragged from her home by her boyfriend Daniel Jones
- Jones drove Miss Lazell across Hampshire to an abandoned quarry
- He ordered Miss Lazell to strip naked and tied her to a tree and drove off
- Miss Lazell managed to free herself before Jones returned to the scene
- She hid in a bramble bush until Jones disappeared from the quarry
- Since the terrifying attack, Miss Lazell has been living in a safe house
- Jones was jailed for 20 months and ordered to stay away for five years
- However, Miss Lazell said she thinks the jail term was not severe enough
- She said she thought she was going to die and is still constantly afraid
A young mother told how her boyfriend
kidnapped her, drove her to an abandoned quarry, made her strip naked
and tied her to a tree – because she said she wanted to go home to bed.
Sophie Lazell, now 26, was nearly asleep
when Daniel Jones barged in to the home she shared with her mother and
children and grabbed her by the hair.
In front of her family, he dragged her from her bed and drove her for miles to an abandoned quarry in Hampshire.
Sophie Lazell, left, was at home in Hampshire when her boyfriend Daniel Jones, right, burst into the house
Jones, right, grabbed Miss Lazell, left, and
took her to an abandoned quarry, forced her to strip and tied her to a
tree before abandoning her. He was later sentenced to 20 months in
prison for the terrifying kidnap
There he told her ‘there’s already a hole dug for you’ before ordering her to strip and tying her to a tree with her pyjamas.
He then drove off, leaving her freezing cold and petrified.
She escaped by breaking free of her
makeshift ties, hiding in a bramble bush and running through fields
naked for around an hour until she found a house which was occupied by
an elderly couple who called 999.
Remarkably she suffered only cuts and bruises in the attack, although she has been left anxious and ‘on red alert’.
Speaking publically for the first time
since the incident in December 2013, Miss Lazell, now living at an
undisclosed location in UK, said she had spent the day with Jones, but
he had become upset when she said she wanted to spend the night alone.
He kept calling her so she turned her phone to silent mode and settled into bed for the night.
Miss Lazell said: ‘I was just nodding off when I heard a crashing noise.
‘It sounded like the front door being kicked in. Then I heard Daniel, shouting.
‘He said, “Where is she, the liar?”
‘I got up and found Daniel wielding a
metal bar. He had smashed the TV. He said, “come with me”. Then my mum
appeared, and my kids came out of their room.’
Miss Lazell said she was disappointed by the
sentence Jones received, believing that he would have been jailed for
longer than 20 months
At this point Jones pulled Miss Lazell
towards the front door. In a desperate bid to appease him she offered to
run away with him.
‘I had to calm him down,’ she explained.
‘I hoped all the commotion would wake a neighbour who’d call the police.
But I didn’t hear any sirens.
‘As I was leaving I told my kids it would be all right. But I was terrified.’
Jones drove Miss Lazell for ‘what seemed like hours’ to ‘a wooded track that led to a deserted quarry.’
‘He demanded I take my trousers off,’ Miss Lazell – who was wearing pyjamas – said.
‘He then led me to a tree, wrapped my arms around it, and tied them up with my pyjama bottoms.
‘He said, “that’s what happens to whores,” and then forced me to strip completely.’
After a time he drove off and she made her escape, hiding in a ditch when she heard his car.
‘I was terrified,’ she said. ‘I could only see horses’ fields.
‘There were no lights on or houses.
‘I ran for my life.
‘I must have been running for an hour, when I spotted a house.’
The police were called and she was taken
to hospital. Jones went on the run and was arrested four weeks later.
But the attack had a longer lasting impact on Miss Lazell.
‘Before, I’d had lots of friends and enjoyed going out on the town,’ she said.
‘After I didn’t know who to trust and was scared to even pop out for a bottle of milk.
‘I only left the house at certain times of the day when I thought town would be quiet and I was on the red alert when I did.
‘I suffered anxiety attacks and had nightmares.’
In July last year Jones, of Tongham, Hampshire, appeared at Salisbury Crown Court where he pleaded guilty to kidnap.
Ms Lazell said that she was taken to hospital for treatment but it took police four weeks to track Jones down
Neighbours of Miss Lazell said they had heard Jones say: ‘You can run Sophie, but you won’t get far.’
Her eldest son was heard to say: ‘He’s going to kill my mum.’
In August, he was sentenced to 20 months in prison for kidnap, and received a five-year restraining order.
Miss Lazell said: ‘I’d hoped he’d get longer.’
She urged other women to be alert to potential warnings of domestic abuse.
‘My parents had been shocked that Daniel was capable of hurting me,’ she said.
I guess on the surface our relationship
looked like it was going well. But before the attack he always wanted to
know what I’d been up to, was accusing me of cheating. Now I want to
encourage other women to leave bad relationships.
‘Walk out on physically violent,
emotionally and mentally abusive partners. I learnt the hard way that
you shouldn’t brush things under the carpet. Please, get out, before
things turn ugly.’
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