Lewes Court hears of banker's weapons cache

Lewes Crown Court has heard how a spurned City banker armed himself with a cache of weapons including crossbows and a gun after being dumped by a doctor he met through a high-earners dating site.

Al Amin Dhalla, a Canadian national, is also alleged to have set fire to Alison Hewitt's parent's house during a four month campaign against the doctor from Brighton after she split up with him in 2010.

Prosecutor Richard Barton said: "His criminal conduct started with thefts and criminal damage, continued through harassment of his former partner and family and escalated into conduct which endangered the lives of others."

Dhalla, 42-years-old, was eventually arrested by armed officers at the hospital where Hewitt worked - but only after a police helicopter airlifted her parents to safety from the secluded holiday home in Lundy Island he had tracked them down to, Lewes Crown Court heard. He had posed as a doctor at the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath and the weapons were found in his car.

Alison's mum Pamela and partner David Gray were suspicious when he seemed in a rush to marry after quickly moving from his home in Fulham, London, to Hewittt's place in Brighton. They then allegedly learnt Dhalla, who had claimed he was an orphan and younger than his actual age, had hidden a criminal record.

When they confronted him, he became "agitated and threatening", Lewes crown court heard.

He was later seen carrying out target practice in a field en route to Lundy Island and was arrested, and later bailed, on weapons charges.

The next day he drove to Pamela and David's home in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, and torched it. Nobody was hurt.

Dhalla, who came to the UK in 2009, denies 10 charges, including aggravated harassment, arson reckless as to endangering life and possession of an offensive weapon.

The trial continues.