April 02, 2022
On October 12th 2016 the body of 24 year old Alice Ruggles was discovered blue and bloody on the bathroom floor of her apartment in the North East of England.
She shared the residence with friend and flatmate Maxine McGill, who discovered the body and made a frantic call to emergency services.
“She’s covered in blood!”, “Her leg looks broken!”, “She’s blue!”
Alice’s throat had been slit multiple times. So brutal was the attack, that the blade used to slash at her neck had gone through with such force that it grazed her spine. Maxine voiced a strong opinion of whom she believed to be responsible; Alice’s obsessed ex-boyfriend, a man named Trimann “Harry” Dhillon. Dhillon was a signaller for The Royal Highland Fusiliers (commonly referred to as “2 SCOTS”) in Scotland- a 2 and a half hour drive from the crime scene.
Ruggles had split up with Dhillon due to his controlling and aggressive attitude towards their relationship. Following the break-up the scorned soldier orchestrated a campaign of harassment, which included obsessive stalking, hacking into Ruggles various online accounts, showing up to her residence and attempting to gain access to the apartment. He made several unannounced visits to Miss Ruggles place, taking him approximately 5 hours there and back each time.
Alice had been chatting with what the media refers to as a possible new love interest. They believe it may have inspired jealousy in Dhillon.
Ruggles and Dhillon had dated online for 3 months while he was stationed in Iraq. They met in person later that year in October, where they made a real world attempt at being a couple. Their romantic online relationship did not translate well into real life and just over six months later was so unbearable and abusive that Alice had to end it. Dhillon had also been chatting to other women over social media the whole time.
Miss Ruggles eventually broke it off with her cheating boyfriend, but the obsessed man was not ready to let her go and displayed a “If I can’t have her no one can” mentality.
It was later discovered that Dhillon had made several visits to the apartment, sometimes leaving gifts, other times trying to get invited inside, but his knocks were always unanswered. He also left voicemails of himself crying, as well as sending pictures of himself crying in a plea to win Alice back.
Alice was so fearful of her ex that she had reported him to the local authorities on two separate occasions. Although afraid, she refused to press charges against him as she didn’t want what she believed to be a bad reaction to their break-up to end Dhillon’s military career. It turned out to be a life ending courtesy move and a testament to just how selfish and obsessed Dhillon really was.
In court, Dhillon attempted to play the murder off as an accident gone wrong, claiming that it was Alice who attacked him. Dhillon explained in great depth the details of their physical altercation, however the judge didn’t buy it and commented that he was concentrating so hard on his story that he’d even forgotten to pretend to be upset. Regardless, he tried to convince the court that there was a struggle and she had fell on the knife. The autopsy investigation disproved this revealing that Dhillon had likely slit his ex-girlfriends throat from behind. So callous was he that it was revealed as Miss Ruggles lay dying on the bathroom floor, Dhillon was swiping right on Tinder in search of a hook up.
He neglected to call emergency services, took the backroads back to Scotland and attempted to sneak back into the military barracks where he was staying.
Unsurprisingly, Alice was not the first girl to be stalked and harassed by Dhillon. His ex-girlfriend came forward to reveal that she too had suffered the same ordeal. Luckily she was able to take out a restraining order to deter him before she suffered the same tragic fate as Alice.
Dhillon was born in India and had attended Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh. After graduating he followed in his father’s footsteps, joined the army and lived in the barracks. His father was a major in the Indian army and Dhillon had apparently been taking the tests necessary to join the Special Forces. At the time that he was in an online relationship with Miss Ruggles he was stationed in Iraq but as a signaller and was not at any point involved in combat.
He was sentenced last month and is currently serving a minimum of 20 years.
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