British 'stalker' followed American influencer to Bali with rope in suitcase after bombarding her with messages about his sexual fantasies, court told
A 'creepy' British stalker travelled to Bali with rope in his suitcase after threatening to kidnap an American travel influencer he had harassed online for almost a year, a court has heard.
Rob Keating, 39, allegedly sent 'incessant and constant' emails and video messages to Alexandra Saper, including his sexual fantasies and a threat to abduct her from her Indonesian tropical island home.
A former lawyer who earns a living from her Instagram page 'The Wayfaress', Ms Saper, 33, has claimed she was forced to flee the country in fear.
Keating is now on trial at Portsmouth Crown Court charged with two counts of stalking involving serious alarm or distress - which he denies.
He allegedly became convinced there was something between himself and the influencer and booked a one-way ticket to Bali, telling her: 'Flights booked baby girl.'
After he arrived on the island, the court heard he messaged her again, saying: 'You're never getting rid of me.'
Keating is a traffic worker who was living in his sister's garage in Havant, Hants, at the time of the alleged offences.
Rob Keating, 39, allegedly sent 'incessant and constant' emails and video messages to Alexandra Saper, including his sexual fantasies and a threat to abduct her
Opening the case, prosecutor Alexandra Bull told the court: 'Mr Keating is now 39 years old, between 2022 and 2023 he was living in his sister's garage...and working in a traffic job and he, too, frequently posted on social media and Youtube.'
He started following Bali-based Ms Saper on Instagram in 2022, and sent her a 'weird and creepy' message in July of that year to which she replied: 'Dude, why are you following me if you don't like my content'.
Ms Saper then blocked him.
The prosecutor said: 'However, Mr Keating then found her business email connected to her website.
'Thereafter, the contact became incessant and constant.'
The influencer tried to block Keating's emails, but this just made them go into her spam folder.
Ms Saper then deleted the emails from this folder - they came in 'almost every day', the court heard.
They became more 'intense' and 'sexual in nature' later into 2022.
In September he 'described having sex with her to some length' in a video of himself talking to the camera attached to the email.
'He was speaking to her as though they were in a relationship, like he was in love with her and she with him,' Ms Bull said.
The prosecutor told the court that in one email, he said he loved her and wanted to be with her and 'he said he would do whatever it takes to make that happen - if that involves kidnapping then so be it'.
In January 2023, he said he would quit his traffic job and 'come and find her' in Bali.
Ms Saper said in a video interview played to the court: 'He sent me a photo of a body in a suitcase and said he was going to kidnap me.'
She added that he said he knew she was 5ft2ins, and this meant she would 'fit inside the suitcase'.
Ms Bull told the court Keating sent Ms Saper a picture of a one-way ticket to Bali and said: 'Flights booked baby girl'.
At this point he was said to have sent her around 30 videos of himself talking to the camera among 'hundreds' of other emails.
On January 30 2023, after he arrived in Bali, he messaged her 'you're never getting rid of me' - the prosecutor said this made her 'very scared'.
Ms Saper saw from posts on his Instagram page that he visited a bar she regularly went to with her friends, and went to cafés just 50 metres from her house.
In her video evidence she said Keating thought she was sending him secret messages through her Instagram posts.
'His interpretation of these posts was that they were secret coded messages about my love for him, or me asking him to come to Bali because I wanted to see him,' she said.
'He was convinced that I had asked him to come to Bali.'
Ms Saper booked a hotel room when she found out he was on the island in case he knew where she lived and then experienced her first ever panic attack as she worried that he had followed her there.
She then stayed at a friend's house in Bali, and later travelled to the South East Asian country of Laos so that they were no longer in the same country.
Ms Saper stopped posting on Instagram and had to cancel work projects because she was concerned about his belief that she was sending him secret messages.
The court heard he had also told her that he knew where her parents lived in America.
She said she became 'depressed' and stopped leaving the house because of Keating's actions.
The influencer reported him to the police in Bali, and spoke to the US and the UK embassies in the country.
He was arrested on his arrival back in the UK in March 2023 - Ms Bull said police found 'black rope' in his suitcase.
Keating told police in an interview that he was not sexually attracted to Ms Saper, but said that 'she had shown an interest in him and there could be something there' between them.
He continued to stalk Ms Saper between September and November 2024, at which point he lived in Horsham in West Sussex, prosecutors allege.
Keating posted a picture of a plane ticket from London to Bali with the caption 'round 2' on his Instagram in November.
He was subsequently arrested.
Ms Saper said in her interview recorded in October 2024: 'Since then, I've tried to do what I can to keep living my life, but it's always on the back of my mind and it's always in my inbox.'
The trial continues.
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