Bunbury man Satnam Singh Rajpal to be subject to GPS tracking after avoiding jail for stalking estranged wife

A Bunbury man is set to be subject to GPS tracking for several months after avoiding jail for breaching a family violence restraining order and stalking his estranged wife. Satnam Singh Rajpal appeared in Bunbury Magistrates Court on Tuesday, February 1, and was sentenced to a conditional suspended imprisonment order for two counts of breaching a family violence restraining order and pursuing another to intimidate. The court was told Rajpal followed his wife into the Bunbury Farmers Market during the morning of January 5 by parking his car diagonally from hers and walked towards her “with purpose”. When he saw the victim, Rajpal “stood over” her and asked her to drop the restraining order so he could come back to the family home, the court heard. The victim, who was stuck between Rajpal, her trolley and a fruit stand unable to move away for several minutes, called her teenage daughter to get her to call police. An off-duty police officer who entered Bunbury Farmers Market saw the terrified victim and escorted her out of the store and called for backup before Mr Rajpal, who tried to grab the victim by her arm, was taken into custody. In an interview with police, Mr Rajpal said he was shopping for fruit and vegetables not realising the victim was there at the time of the alleged offending, but CCTV footage showed no evidence of Mr Rajpal shopping. The court was told Rajpal had been served with a family violence restraining order that protected his wife in October, barring him from contacting her or approaching her or their children. Before the January incident, Rajpal was seen by police driving his vehicle within 100m of the victim’s home on Christmas Eve, and later told police he was driving in the area “by force of habit”. It came a day after he was convicted of breaching the same order three times despite previously contacting police to confirm the terms of the order. In submissions, Rajpal’s defence counsel Michael Devlin conceded his client was in a “third-striker position” and that his offending was “persistent behaviour”. Magistrate Joanne Andretich responded to the submission, telling Mr Devlin she formed the view that Rajpal “doesn’t seem to understand that he doesn’t own her” despite the relationship starting as an arranged marriage. In her sentencing remarks on Tuesday, Ms Andretich told Rajpal if his wife no longer wanted to be with him, “she’s entitled in this society to do so” and it was not up to him to decide. Along with the 18-month jail term that was suspended for 12 months, Rajpal was ordered to take part in relevant supervision and programs, as well as to be subject to GPS tracking for four months to bar him from approaching the complainant and their children.