The girl at the centre of Steven Gerrard
death threats reveals all.
Lauren Ashcroft came forward to reveal SHE was the reason
jealous Liverpool mobster George Bromley Junior made death threats
against the soccer ace. It happened because Gerrard kept on
flirting with her after they'd broken up...and her new gangster
boyfriend became insanely jealous.
Chilling details of Bromley's two-year vendetta—in which
frightened Gerrard had to be given police protection—emerged in a
court case last week. But breaking her five-year silence on the
nightmare, 22-year-old Lauren said the feud had ruined her life.
"None of it was my fault but it just won't go away however much I
want it to—only yesterday someone said to me ‘I don't know if you
are a footballer's Wag or a gangster's moll'. "I don't want to be
either. And I can't be held responsible for someone else's
jealousy."
In an outspoken interview Lauren—15 at the time it all
happened—tells how smitten midfielder Gerrard
PURSUED her after their teenage romance had ended.
She tells how she felt ABANDONED by the star
AND his club who left her to cope with the anger
of Liverpool fans who blamed her when Bromley started hounding
their hero.
And she SLAMS Gerrard's wife Alex Curran's WAG
lifestyle— claiming he would have been far better off staying with
her instead of "living in misery". Lauren's ordeal began in 2001
when her romance with the then 19-year-old Gerrard ended and she
had briefly dated local villain Bromley, also 19 at the time.
Jealousy
His notorious father Bromley Senior was gunned down during a
gangland feud in November 2003. And George—now in jail for Class A
drugs offences—was following in his footsteps as part of a mob of
torturers notorious for BURNING their victims with a red-hot
iron.
Hospital worker Lauren said: "Steve and me stayed friends even
after we split up. He would still ring or pop in for a cup of tea.
"Sometimes if he'd had a drink he would phone and say ‘You want to
get back with me' and ‘What would you be doing now if you hadn't
split with me'.
"I thought maybe he wanted to pick things up with me."
But news of Gerrard's visits to his old love's home rankled with
‘Psycho' Bromley even though his own relationship with Lauren had
ended months earlier. Bromley's jealousy spilled over into violence
in November 2001 when a brick went through the window of Gerrard's
£50,000 BMW X5 parked outside her home.
Scared Gerrard immediately broke off contact with Lauren. She
said: "That day ruined it. My relationship with Steve as a friend
stopped. I was devastated because we got on so well, even as
mates." But Bromley's campaign of hatred began in earnest. He made
death threats against the star, threatened to blow Gerrard's
KNEECAPS off, challenged him to a fist
FIGHT and even AMBUSHED him
outside his luxury home in Southport, Merseyside.
Bromley's vendetta escalated when the thug threatened Gerrard's
new girlfriend Alex. The terrified star was forced to fortify his
£3million Crosby mansion with 12ft high iron gates and hi-tech CCTV
cameras. It only ended when Gerrard's dad Paul brought in gangland
enforcer John Kinsella, 43, to "deal" with Bromley Jnr—a revelation
that emerged last week during Kinsella's robbery trial at Lincoln
Crown Court.
Lauren reckons Gerrard and Alex Curran must be unhappy at the
revelations that once again give fans the impression they have
links with the underworld. She said: "I don't know why all the
gangland stuff has never gone away for Steve. He doesn't want this
brought up again and Alex definitely doesn't. "If it was my husband
I would be saying ‘Why is this still carrying on? Why can't we sort
it out?' It must drive her mad."
Lauren believes Gerrard is miserable enough as it is—just being
married to Alex. She said she would never have become a
tracksuit-wearing Wag if she had gone on to marry her childhood
sweetheart. She said: "Steve just doesn't appear the fun-loving lad
I remember him as. He looks MISERABLE. You can see
he is not the person he was. He looks like he's got the weight of
the world on his shoulders.
"It's heartbreaking for him. He is loyal, he just wants a family
life. I would be a very different wife. I wouldn't be a Wag. I
would be a stay-at-home mum and wife." Lauren has fond memories of
her down-to-earth teenage relationship with Gerrard. She laughed:
"He was a real romantic, for our first date he took me to his dad's
local to play pool. He had a great sense of humour."
While they were dating he would spend as much time as he could
with Lauren even if that meant sitting with her at the sunbed shop
where she worked. Lauren said: "I was there three days a week and
at weekends and he'd just come and sit with me. "I never felt like
a Wag, I never looked at him like he was a big star footballer—but
then again he never behaved like that."
They split after three months. "He was away a lot and I was
still at school so we thought it was better if we were just mates,"
said Lauren. "Then all that gangland stuff happened. I wish it
never had." And this week the court case has opened old wounds for
Lauren. She said: "The latest stuff has been a bolt out of the
blue. I go out now and people point at me saying ‘There's that girl
from the gangland love triangle'.
"I hate the fact that my name is linked to all this gangland
stuff. It's nothing to do with me." It reminds her of how she felt
abandoned by Gerrard and the club when the vendetta first became
known in Liverpool. "I thought too much of Steve then to talk to
the papers about what happened," said Lauren. "But when it got out
I went straight to Liverpool FC to tell them what was
happening.
"I wanted Steve to know I hadn't spoken about what had happened.
But again I didn't have any contact from him. Not even a phone
call. "When he needed it he got all the protection on offer. He had
a big club around him. "But when I needed it I didn't get anything.
I was left to cope alone with just my mother behind me."