NORTH EAST MAN JAILED FOR DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AFTER STRANGLING AND SPITTING ON EX-PARTNER
A "fairy tale" romance ended in horror when a domestic abuser strangled and spat on his partner.The victim had been in a relationship with Christopher Taylor for around two years and said it had begun to deteriorate before he turned violent.
She said he would regularly lie to her and they would argue but he had not been physically aggressive before.
However on April 12 this year, he returned home after drinking and told her his phone was dead.
She asked to see it as she didn't believe him and he tried to push a door shut to prevent her getting into the room where he was.
When she got in, he kept pushing her backwards onto the sofa by the throat, doing so four or five times.
He then picked her up by the throat and pinned her against the front door, warning: "One punch and I could break your jaw".
After that, the relationship was over but they continued living in the same house while alternative arrangements were made.
On May 25, she had been out in Newcastle city centre and saw him in a bar, where he called her an abusive name.
The following morning, she was lying in bed when he went into her room around 8am, pulled the quilt off her, grabbed her phone and demanded to see if she had been texting any men.
He took her phone, eventually giving it back before following her and calling her names.
Gurjot Kaur, prosecuting, said: "He then pinned her down onto the bed by her throat with one hand and she struggled to breathe.
He spat in her face." The victim called her friend so she could hear what he was saying to her and the friend called the police.
In a victim impact statement, the woman said: "The events of the 26th of May were among the most painful and distressing experiences of my life.
While I was asleep in my bed where I should have felt safe, the man I devoted the last two years of my life to attacked me." She said the relationship initially "felt like a fairy tale" but that there were soon "red flags" like his dishonesty.
She added: "I've lost confidence, questioning how someone that claimed to love me could cause me so much pain." When police attended at the house in Whickham, to arrest him, Taylor claimed his partner had been the aggressor and he pushed her in self defence.
However the 40-year-old, of Park Road North, Chester-le-Street, later pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm, assault by beating and strangulation.
He has now been jailed for 14 months by Recorder Andrew Latimer.
Spencer Downey, defending, said: "He is very ashamed of his actions and he has shown some genuine remorse, mainly for the effects this has caused on a woman he once loved." Mr Downey said Taylor employs people in a business he runs and they would suffer if he was jailed.
