Former Mr. Bermuda bodybuilder Carlos Astwood appeared in court yesterday accused of stalking a former girlfriend.

Astwood, 36, denies stalking Sandra Ruth, causing alarm by threatening her reputation, and using offensive words in a public place between February 1998 and October 1999.

Ms Ruth's current boyfriend, Gregory Raynor, told Magistrate Will Francis that he escorts her everywhere because she still lives in fear of Astwood.

Astwood, who is representing himself, faces a maximum sentence of one year in jail and/or a $2,500 fine if found guilty.

Ms Ruth, of Hamilton Parish, said she had a relationship with Astwood for four years ending in 1997, but she wanted to finish it after a year.

She said Astwood confronted her outside her office in Gorham Road, Hamilton, and told her to "shut her legs''.

She said she told him to `go to hell' but that Astwood returned and told her `I'm not finished with you yet'.

She told the court: "To this day just hearing the words repeated upsets me because I know he means it.'' In June of 1999 she said Astwood spotted her in a laundromat and stood behind her, laughed, walked out and returned to repeat this several times, placing her in a state of alarm.

A few weeks later, she received a voicemail message at work asking her to call a pager number. Mr. Raynor called the number and left his cell number.

She then received a call from a man who appeared to be impersonating an American friend of hers, who said `You've got some nerve sleeping with someone else'.

In another confrontation outside her office in August 1999, she said Astwood kept telling Mr. Raynor he needed to inform him about Ms Ruth.

She said: "He called me names, that I was a whore, that I was a married woman, an adulteress. Then I got angry and I was cursing him. He came toward me and Mr. Raynor got between us and kept telling him to leave me alone, it was over.

"It was very heated because Mr. Raynor had to keep getting between him and keeping him off. If looks could kill I would be dead.

"He was saying it was he who had made me who I was and that I had got fat because he was not in my life anymore, and that he raised my daughter.'' In 1999 she went to the Women's Resource Centre to get help getting a restraining order against Astwood, whose address was not given.

"Since then I constantly have to watch my back. The feeling of fear persists until today,'' she said.

During yesterday's session Astwood tried to cross-examine Ms Ruth but he was constantly interrupted by Mr. Francis, who warned him against asking irrelevant questions.

Ms Ruth said she did try to contact Astwood after their relationship broke off, but it was at the request of Mr. Raynor after a pager message had been left, believed to be from Astwood, on her answering machine.

On another occasion, she had to find out his address so a restraining order could be delivered to him.

Astwood told Mr. Francis he had no interest in Ms Ruth because his life had moved on.

Mr. Raynor said he called the pager number Ms Ruth received and left his cell phone number. Later a man claiming to be a friend of Astwood called to warn him about Ms Ruth because she was supposedly deceiving him and had wrongly accused Astwood.

He ended the conversation but said the same person called the next day saying the same things.

"When I asked if he would have her back, he said `yes','' said Mr. Raynor.

"When I said `This must be Mr. Astwood,' he replied `yes'. He said he wanted me to know exactly what was going on.'' Astwood denied he had made the first telephone call, insisting it was a friend.

Describing the confrontation outside Ms Ruth's work, Mr. Raynor said: "Mr.

Astwood was saying she had put on weight and was drinking. He called her a bitch. Every other word was an obscenity.

"He said: `You're f***ing going down and I'm rising to the top and it's not f***ing well over'.

"A co-worker took Ms Ruth inside. I called the Police on my cell phone and he said, `The Police can't do a f***ing thing to me'. He seemed ready to rumble.

The veins in his neck were sticking up.

"Ms Ruth was very nervous and scared to leave the house. I took her everywhere because she's terrified, right up until today.'' Astwood put it to both witnesses that he did not use profanities, but both rejected this.

The trial was adjourned until Monday.