A YOUNG woman has vowed not to return to Reading after she was taken hostage on a night out more than three years ago.
The man who held her and her friend hostage, Samuel St Fort, was this morning jailed for seven years after threatening the girls with a knife and punching one of them with a boxing glove.
After escaping through a bathroom window following an ordeal that lasted ‘several hours’, the woman had to hide under a car to avoid being detected by St Fort, who was 20 at the time of the incident.
In a victim statement, one of the girls said she was scared of returning to Reading following the frightening events.
St Fort’s prison term also stems from the ‘violent’ and ‘sadistic’ ways he treated another woman from August 2020 to April 2021, including whipping her with a charging cable and hitting her with a hammer.
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Appearing at Reading Crown Court this morning, the 23-year-old, of Wensley Road, appeared in the dock in a grey tracksuit clutching a Bible.
Edward Lucas, prosecuting, said three girls travelled from Oxford to Reading on August 12, 2018, and met St Fort at his flat.
They were planning to go out drinking at nightclubs when one of the girls “soiled themselves” on his bedroom floor.
This ‘annoyed’ St Fort, who got out a knife and threatened two of the girls with it over the course of several hours after telling them they were not allowed to leave.
In this time he would also strangle and punch one girl on the nose with a boxing glove, and smash two of their phones.
The second girl taken hostage was forced to clean up the mess made.
Their ordeal ended when one girl escaped by climbing out of a bathroom window. She hid under a car after calling police, who then arrested St Fort.
St Fort was also being sentenced for incidents that took place between him and a woman from August 2020 and April 2021.
Reading Crown Court heard how he became became “violent” and “controlling” towards her at the end of 2020.
A notebook kept by St Fort detailed how the woman should behave around him.
“He intended to humiliate and control her”, Mr Lucas said.
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His behaviour towards her became “sadistic” in April 2021, when he instructed her to get on the floor and hit herself with a hammer.
He was not satisfied she was doing this so he started hitting her with the hammer instead.
St Fort also whipped the woman with a charging cable 35 times. He was arrested after she called the police on April 27, 2021.
Mr Lucas added: “What should concern this court is the behaviour of this defendant towards young women in his care and control.
“He behaved in a violent and sadistic manner.”
The prosecutor said the woman had seen her confidence “decrease massively.”
One of the girls taken hostage by the defendant said she thought she was going to die the evening she was held captive at St Fort’s home in her victim statement, while the other said she would not come to Reading anymore.
John Simmons, defending, said St Fort had a troubled childhood in-and-out of care and that he was showing signs of “mature reflection.”
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In a letter to His Honour Judge Nawaz, St Fort said he was “not thinking clearly” at the time of the incidents and that he had “worked hard on letting go of my anger”.
Sentencing, Judge Nawaz said: “It must be a matter of shame and regret to you that these offences were perpetrated against females who had been in your company.”
Speaking of the first incident, in which two girls were taken hostage, the judge added: “I have no doubt they must have been in extreme fear while in your company.”
Judge Nawaz said St Fort subjected the girl he was in a relationship with to “indignity and degradation.”
“The victim statements do not make for happy reading. Each [victim] has been left psychologically scarred.
“They are afraid to go out and that is a sad state of affairs for them.”
St Fort was sentenced to seven years imprisonment for two counts of criminal damage, one count of engaging in controlling or coercive behaviour, two counts of assault, and two counts of false imprisonment.
The 23-year-old will serve at least half of this sentence behind bars.
He was sentenced at Reading Crown Court on Tuesday, January 4.
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