A MAN has denied carrying out a campaign of harassment against staff at Linacre College and ‘letter bombing’ the grounds with an un-manned drone.

Hamad Nejad, of Elizabeth Jennings Way, Summertown, Oxford, is charged with one count of harassment without violence.

Prosecutors allege that the 34-year old carried out a range of acts which constituted harassment at the Oxford college, between January 24 and September 17 last year.

He appeared at Oxford Magistrates’ Court yesterday where, smartly dressed in a suit jacket, he spoke only to confirm his name.

The alleged harassment, the court heard, included the sending of numerous e-mails as well as postings on social media deemed offensive, abusive and homophobic.

Nejad is also alleged to have deliberately attended the college despite being placed under suspension.

On two occasions, prosecutors maintain, he sent an un-manned drone into the grounds before dropping hundreds of leaflets at the historic college on July 22 and September 17.

Presiding over the hearing District Judge Kamlesh Rana ordered that the offence could be appropriately tried before a magistrates’ court and not before a judge and jury at the crown court.

Nejad will appear again at Oxford Magistrates’ Court for his two-day trial to commence on June 28.

He was released on bail with conditions including no contact with staff or students at Linacre College and not fly any un-manned aircraft with the ‘exclusion zone’ of the college.

Earlier this year another unrelated charge of administering a poison to inflict grievous bodily harm was dropped and the charge dismissed at Oxford Crown Court. That charge was in connection with an incident at his north Oxford flat on November 9 last year.