Sentenced to 5.5 years and subjected to restraining orders
A solicitor who spent time working in the London offices of several top US law firms has been jailed for five and half years after being convicted for stalking her neighbours.
Linda Lu, 35, repeatedly used “derogatory abuse peppered with foul slurs”, blared loud, taunting music, and subjected her neighbours to persistent banging and metallic noises, according to a statement from Lincolnshire Police.
Legal Cheek reported that Lu, along with her mother, Susan Chen, was found guilty of stalking in October, a charge involving behaviour that caused serious alarm or distress. The trial, initially expected to last seven days, ended up running for six weeks.
Lu spent time in the London offices of several leading US firms, including Fried Frank, Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, and Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. She completed her training at Scottish outfit Dickson Minto and qualified as a solicitor in 2015.
The pair were also issued indefinite restraining orders, prohibiting them from contacting the victims, their family, other witnesses, or their employers. They must also not attend any location those people may be, or enter the village of Bassingham.
A separate restraining order was also issued not to contact either police officer involved in the case directly or indirectly.
Prior to being charged, Lu and her mother were issued with community protection notices, warning letters, and arrested on several occasions. This did not deter their behaviour, as Lu sent multiple “entirely vexatious” civil letters of claim to the victims as part of their stalking activities.
On sentencing, Judge James House KC said that the pair had begun a “persistent, calculated and appalling series of behaviours designed to cause the victims the maximum distress possible”, adding that it was “one of the most serious cases of this kind that this court has had to deal with”.
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