Alex Belfield: who is Alex Belfield, what did he do and when will he be released from prison? Things you should know about BBC stalker

Following the publication of the memo, tacked to the BBC’s online media centre notice board, Liz Green issued a statement that read: “The effects of stalking are that fear becomes part of your life. I expected the BBC to use available laws to stop it, for us to be listened to and taken care of.”

“For over a decade, that did not happen. They have apologised for that and say lessons have been learnt. Every employer needs to protect their staff. The four of us were high profile women in the North. We have all subsequently left the BBC.”

Who is Alex Belfield - why was he sent to prison?

Even during his time on mainstream radio, working for the licence-fee-funded BBC, Belfield was a self-styled maverick whose stock-in-trade was his own brand of childishly ‘edgy’ controversy – in other words, a ‘shock-jock’. Presenting himself as a courageous, marauding protector of free speech, he is in fact a bully capable of the most destructive, obsessive behaviour, hiding behind the premise of free speech in order to do and say whatever titillates his perversions whilst at the same time animating an army of believers who victims fear, even today, might be moved to attack one of Belfield’s targets.

One example of Belfield’s brand of confected ‘edginess’ was an on-air exchange with BBC broadcasting meteorologist Keeley Donovan, back in 2010, which later led to his suspension from the BBC - for just one day - having subjected Ms Donovan to a vulgar, sexually charged verbal assault, soaked in misogyny.

He said to Ms Donovan: “It’s always nice to see a smiley face in a morning … sitting on my sofa watching Keeley Donovan in my underpants … actually, the bit about having underpants on is a lie, I go to bed naked, so there I am on my sofa, which is leather, so you can wipe it down afterwards.”

As Ms Donovan professionally maintained her composure, delivering her weather forecast to listeners despite the barrage of sexism, Belfield cuts across her again: “Throughout that whole thing I didn’t hear a single word you said because throughout the whole thing I just had the image of me, naked on the sofa, watching you on the telly.” Ms Donovan sternly fires back: “No comment!”

Belfield’s perverted suggestion is clear, as clear as his intention to belittle, demean and dehumanise Ms Donovan. She was, however, not the only recipient of Belfield’s unwanted and unsolicited attentions. Alongside his crude attempts at testy humour, Belfield took twisted pleasure in whipping up hate mobs, acting as a conductor of an orchestra of angry acolytes who would pour ire towards individuals he selected for trauma.

In 2022, Belfield was sentenced to five and a half years behind bars for having waged multiple campaigns of stalking. The judge, when sentencing Belfield, said: “You didn’t meet or physically approach or watch any of your victims as a traditional stalker might have done, your methods were, though, just as effective as a way of intimidating your victims and were, in many ways, much harder to deal with.” He added that Belfield had ‘weaponised the internet’ in order to cause maximum alarm and distress.

So serious were his campaigns of intimidation and harassment that victims described themselves as having been brought to the point where they contemplated taking their own lives. BBC Radio 2 stalwart, Jeremy Vine, was one of Belfield’s victims. He said in an interview about Belfield: “Had the courts not stopped Alex Belfield, somebody would have died.” In that interview Mr Vine goes on to say that Belfield’s YouTube channel, The Voice of Reason was a ‘fountain of hate’ and one that Belfield ‘knew’ would motivate attacks ‘by proxy’ from vigilantes, infected and driven by Belfield’s poison.

Belfield, however, was not convicted of stalking Rozina Breen, Elizabeth Green, Stephanie Hirst and Helen Thomas. Until this week, their ordeals have barely been acknowledged. His five and a half years in jail was his punishment for stalking others. Instead he received an indefinite restraining order, banning him from ever making contact with the women again. The BBC’s staff safety policies enabled Belfield to target, bully, intimidate and harass the four women with impunity. Its recent statement added: “We simply did not do enough for these members of staff.”

Alex Belfield: The Voice of Reason – why won’t YouTube shut him down?

As well as DJing and presenting on the radio, Belfield built up a large social media following through that aforementioned YouTube channel, The Voice of Reason; it continues to attract 320,000 subscribers. Despite desperate attempts by his victims to remove his unfettered access – one so desperate that they walked in to the reception of YouTube’s London headquarters to plead for help in removing libellous content – to the very thing that Belfield used, amongst other social media platforms, to the point of driving people to think about killing themselves, he still has access. He remains in possession of the very weapons with which he was caught red-handed, using electronic communication tools to attack people and to whip-up coordinated, spiteful vitriol from others towards his victims.

In fact, incredibly, The Voice of Reason, announced just two months ago that Belfield will return to his ‘fountain of hate’ in June of this year. Typically, his return to YouTube is entitled: Alex Belfield 5.5 years jail - witch hunt exposed. It is textbook Belfield, dripping in self-pity, cynicism and conspiracy theory. The title adds: “Let’s close him down” … corrupt BBC and police.

The opening gambit of the latest address to his 320,000 subscribers comes from his producer who states: “It all went a bit wrong, didn’t it. Do you remember in September 2022, when the evil BBC and corrupt Nottingham [sic] Police colluded to close him down?” He adds: “They wanted him dead.”

It is hauntingly reminiscent of his proven M.O. and will strike fear into those he terrorised previously. Working from the adage that one can best judge a man by the company he keeps, here is a selection of the comments beneath this latest YouTube video:

• “When you tear out a man's tongue, you are not proving him a liar, you're only telling the world that you fear what he might say.”
• Another man thrown under the bus for speaking the truth
• Welcome back Alex. Katie has been keeping us up with the news from your wrong-incarceration
• "Distrust the government, avoid mass media, fight the lies!" - Dr. Vernon Coleman
• Another example of miscarriages of justice, that happens too often in this country that is seemingly full of incompetent people in the wrong jobs

The producer persists with the conspiracies, claiming ‘Belfield was banged up for words’, nothing more. There is a concerning refusal to accept that he did anything wrong, only the repeated assertion that he is in fact the victim. Early on in the low-rent production, producer ‘Tarquin’ hands over to who we are introduced to as ‘AI Alex’, a technologically-enabled narrating tool that purports to convey Belfield’s thoughts from behind bars.

Where does he begin? You guessed it: “AI Belfield, here, Alex Belfield who was kidnapped by the State in September 2022. Closed down by the .Gov mafia who didn’t like his hurty words and hurt feelings. They did what they could, they wanted him dead. Cancelled. Finished. Silenced. Why? Because he was a pain in the anus. He triggered the crackpots. The medicated mafia. He loved winding up the mental morons.”

In an attempt to further amuse his audience, he ridicules the rule of law and begins mocking the punishment handed to him, for crimes that have left people’s careers, confidence, lives in tatters – some driven to contemplating suicide – Belfield first of all reveals his complete lack of remorse but at the same time, seemingly inadvertently, acknowledges that he understands perfectly well what he was trying to achieve through his particular method of stalking. “How can you stalk people you’ve never met?” ‘AI Alex’ asks…if he doesn’t know the answer to that question, now, he never will.

His victims, however, know only too well the answer to that question, and will no-doubt be feeling increasingly uneasy as his release from prison draws nearer, that sinister promise he made to them back in 2022 coming true: “We will be back!”

A judge agreed with those victims, such that it was deemed appropriate to sentence him to more than five years in jail, half of which he has served. YouTube, however … YouTube continues to give Belfield a platform, one that, granted, he can no longer monetise – YouTube did turn off that tap – but one he does use to promote the things he does plan to monetise and one that has enabled him to sign off of his latest missive with: “Alex Belfield is fit, healthy, well, sound of mind and excited to be back in 2025. Should anything happen to him in the meantime, this will be solely down to the dark forces at .Gov which created that witch hunt.”

Let alone his YouTube channel, his access to digital communication – full stop – should be removed, his weapons taken from him. It is the least his victims deserve, and is clearly the only way to prevent more people being harmed by him.