A stalker has been jailed for five years after a judge heard how he was destroying a Bradford teenage girl's life.

Infatuated James Edmundson, 36, began harassing his victim when she was only 13 and in November 2002 Bradford magistrates imposed an indefinite restraining order banning him from making any kind of contact with the girl or her family.

But Edmundson, of Hustler Street, Undercliffe, Bradford, had repeatedly ignored the prohibition, a jury at the city's crown court heard yesterday, and they found him guilty of eight more breaches.

Sentencing him Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC said he had to protect the victim for as long as possible.

He told Edmundson: "She doesn't know why you have developed an obsessive, dysfunctional, unwanted, abnormal and deeply disturbing obsession.

"Letters, visits to her home, following her, the whole gamut of behaviour.

"Now it's right that only on one occasion have you seized hold of her by the hand...but I am satisfied that there is here a deeply worrying, deeply distressing, abnormal and dysfunctional course of conduct which will not stop.'' During his trial Edmundson said he would not co-operate in any way with the court and Judge Durham Hall branded him "seriously flawed and very arrogant".

In the past Edmundson had thrown stones at the girl's bedroom window, left flowers outside her home and even sent her a Valentine's Day card bearing the message: ''To the most beautiful girl in the world''.

He had also pestered the family with phone calls and sent the girl a tape of him singing.

On other occasions Edmundson turned up at her home and had even followed her round Bradford city centre for an hour when she was out shopping with a friend.

Prosecutor Heather Weir told the court that the victim, now aged 18, did not know Edmundson, had never had a relationship with him and had never suggested that she liked him.

Miss Weir said: "Notwithstanding this James Edmundson has sent letters and audio tapes through the post to her declaring his love for her and saying they should be together.

"When she tried to challenge him he ignored what she told him and said simply 'I love you and want to be with you'."

Miss Weir said Edmundson's "persistent and unwanted attentions" had been very distressing for the teenager.

The latest breaches were committed between March and May this year when Edmundson sent his victim three hand-written letters, three audio tapes, a card and a prayer book.

The victim recognised Edmundson's handwriting on the envelopes and some them even had a distinctive "crown and halo" logo drawn on them.The full contents of the letters and tapes were not disclosed in court, but the jury heard that one of the tapes was mainly music and the others were full 90-minute tapes of Edmundson talking.

Judge Durham Hall said Edmundson's "ramblings" in the letters and tapes were deeply sinister and disturbing.

In a statement the teenager said: "I'm scared of what he (Edmundson) might do to me.

It has begun to affect my home life and my family. James Edmundson is destroying my life. I want him to stop. I don't know what else I can do to stop him."

At a previous trial the teenager gave her evidence via a television link, but yesterday she stood in the witness box for just over half-an-hour.

The softly-spoken teenager described how she felt sick every time she received an envelope from Edmundson.

Items sent to the teenager were later examined and Edmundson's fingerprints were found on some of them.

Following his arrest in May Edmundson refused to answer any questions put to him by police and yesterday he refused to give any evidence in his own defence.

He denied eight allegations of breaching the restraining order, but it took the jury less than half-an-hour to find him guilty on all charges.

Edmundson has been subject to increasingly severe prison sentences over the last few years for breaching the restraining order, but last year a two-year jail term was reduced by the Court of Appeal to 12 months.