host was “under police guard” after “sinister” messages were found on a man’s phone reportedly threatening to “seriously harm” the daytime TV presenter.Prosecution Alison Morgan KC said that Gavin Plumb, a security guard from Harlow in Essex, had a serious and “real intention” to kidnap the daytime star from her home and take her to “a location where she would be raped repeatedly”, before murdering her.
Plumb has denied accusations of soliciting murder, inciting kidnap and inciting rape made against him. “It was not just the ramblings of a fantasist; the defendant had carefully planned what he would do,” Morgan said. The prosecution added that Plumb’s alleged plans only came to light after he shared them with an undercover police officer based in the US, with whom he’d been speaking online.Morgan told the court: “The defendant explained his plans to kidnap, rape and murder the celebrity Holly Willoughby. The defendant set out his plans and sought to encourage the other person to commit those offences with him.
“The defendant’s plans as to what he would do to Holly Willoughby were graphic and were obviously sexually motivated. They were real to him, members of the jury, and were based on an obsession with Holly Willoughby that had developed over a number of years.”“What the defendant did not know then, was that the person that he was communicating with online was an undercover police officer based in the USA and not, in fact, a like-minded abductor,” she added.