A woman at the centre of a social media storm over a wedding dispute has received death threats, The Courier can reveal.
Police confirmed they are investigating messages sent to Kelly Morris of Balgonie after the online row.
Mrs Morris was branded“unprofessional” and “nasty” after divulging payment details about bride-to-be Henia Roy’s wedding package.
Her remarks, in which she branded some customers “bridezillas” sparked a campaign to boycott her 700-year-old Balgonie Castle venue near Markinch.
Revealing how events took a more sinister turn, Mrs Morris said: “We have received over 150 threatening emails and the phone calls started at midnight and went on through the night up until the police came out to take our statement.
“The police have instructed us to unplug the phones, lock down the castle and keep the CCTV on record.
“I have had to unpublish the Facebook business page and delete contact details from our website.”
Mrs Morris is a third partner in the business after inheriting it from her mother-in-law who passed away in 2014.
The row began when Miss Roy sought advice from other brides-to-be on the Blushing Brides wedding forum about having to pay her meal package three months in advance.
Although Miss Roy did not identify Balgonie as her wedding venue, Mrs Morris took exception, stating she “did not have the patience to deal with Bridezillas” and threatened to stop hosting weddings at the venue.
She also divulged price details of the package, prompting many to question whether data protection rules had been breached.
But Mrs Morris said: “I want to sincerely apologise to everyone who may have suffered from this disastrous situation.”
She said she had had an ongoing dialogue with Miss Roy and did not realise she had concerns and had been “upset” by her questions on the forum
Mrs Morris said: “I felt it was safe to post our terms and conditions to this bride. Balgonie Castle has never had the problems we have suffered since we began our meals packages.
“We had a very horrifying event in 2014 in which one of the drunk guests hit me.
“Since this time, I have been very leery of dealing with wedding packages.
“We actually hired an events manager in 2015 but he could not handle the demands of the brides either.
“We cannot afford to hire anyone on a contract. Balgonie Castle has never received grant funding.”
She continued: “I have tried for the past three years to get our local authority to help us out here.
“We have always tried to keep our local market in mind to provide a great service for a very reasonable price.
“We have also allowed couples to pay out their weddings as well as trying to discount where possible.
“This is why I became so very upset over the wedding blog incident.
“I pulled out of that wedding blog and was very disappointed they did not honour their own rules by deleting the threads.”
Mrs Morris, who runs the castle with husband Stuart and the Laird of Balgonie, Stuart’s dad Raymond,confirmed that Balgonie Castle will stop taking future meal bookings but pledged to honour those already booked.
A Police Scotland spokesman said: “We can confirm we are investigating a report of a threatening communication.
“Inquiries are ongoing.”