By then, Dan has romantically bonded with Phil's barmaid and Lisa's best-friend: Mel Healy (Tamzin Outhwaite). Their growing relationship is initially contracted when Dan befriends and later dates one of the pub's regular customers, Teresa di Marco (Leila Birch), which causes her overprotective brother Gianni (Marc Bannerman) to become suspicious over his intentions. When Gianni witnesses Dan further wooing Teresa and her friends, he confronts them and warns Dan to stay away from his sister. They nearly brawl after Gianni chucks a drink at Dan for dismissing him, but Mel separates them and Teresa later ends her crush on Dan at her family's urging. Dan then continues to develop his relationship with Mel, who soon learns about him reporting Phil and his motor scam to the police. Mel subsequently confines this secrecy to Lisa, who ends up telling Phil about Dan tipping off the police about his motor scam. This causes Phil to end his friendship with Dan, and he later plots to win back his share of the pub as payback. Phil arranges a card game between him and Dan, who ends up losing after the former tricks him into refunding his £5. Outraged, Dan swears revenge on Phil. He soon learns that Mel told Phil about his tip-off and, suspecting that she conspired with Phil against him, begins stalking her — up to the point where he even threatens Mel with phone calls. This continues until Dan, while corning Mel just as she finishes one of her with her night shifts at the pub, finds himself confronted by her boyfriend Steve Owen (Martin Kemp) — who threatens to kill Dan unless he leaves the square. At first Dan ignores Steve and plans to further harass Mel, but is forced to change his mind when Steve visits him with a gun — thus making his threat clear; Dan seemingly complies to his demands and leaves the square on 7 July 2000.