A six-year-old child pleaded with her ju-jitsu-trained father not to kill her mother when he held a knife to the woman’s throat during a ‘vicious’ Christmas Day attack in their home, a court has heard.
The man was sentenced to 20 months jail on Monday after the victim wrote a letter asking for leniency, informing the court that he’d had a personality change after undergoing dental implant surgery in Hungary the month before the attack.
The 49-year-old, who can’t be named for legal reasons, was before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on Monday. He pleaded guilty to assault causing harm to his then partner on 25th December 2019. Another assault on her the following year was taken into consideration.
The woman told gardaí that her then partner became irate around 10.30am on Christmas morning. He walked all over their daughter’s toys and began pulling out drawers, asking, ‘Where is it?’
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He grabbed the woman by her hair and dragged her into their six-year-old daughter’s room, where he hit her in the eye. Her daughter witnessed the attack and was crying: “Don’t hit my Mama”.
She managed to run out of the room with her daughter, but the man then dragged her by her head to the kitchen sink, where he held a kitchen knife up to her chin.
Their daughter again shouted at him: “Don’t kill my Mama.”
At one stage during the attack, the man elbowed the child in the head, causing her to fall. The court heard that this was presumed to be accidental.
The mother and child managed to get out of the apartment. A neighbour opened a door and they ran inside.
The man then drove to the victim’s mother’s house and told her what he had done, and the neighbour decided to drive the victim and her daughter to another location.
While out, the man spotted them in the car and drove at the neighbour’s car with speed.
The man was then out of the home for a while, but began threatening to kill himself if she didn’t take him back. His colleague rang the injured party to say she was worried about his health and arranged for the two of them to speak in March.
The woman told gardaí that things were “okay” for the first two weeks, but that he then became controlling and wanted her to have her phone off every night.
On one occasion, he stormed in from the balcony and put out a cigarette on her face.
Another time, the ju-jitsu-trained man used a martial arts move to restrain her, and she found it hard to breathe. Their child again witnessed this attack.
He had her in a choke hold and she lost consciousness. The next day she was completely bruised, her neck was extremely stiff, and she had swelling to the lower back of her head.
She went to a medical centre, put him out and got an order against him.
Her victim impact statement was handed to the court, in which she stated that she still goes to counselling once a month and attends a woman’s support group once a week.
Pieter Le Vert BL, defending, said that the couple had gone to Hungary in November 2019 so that his client could get dental implants.
“Whatever happened with that operation, she noticed a distinct personality change with him when they returned to Dublin,” he said.
He said that his client and the woman now co-parent their daughter, who has certain issues. He also has a number of children and grandchildren from a different relationship.
Counsel said that the man has worked all his life and obtained a Bachelor’s Degree as an adult.
He handed in a letter that the injured party had written, in which she asked the judge to be lenient. He also handed in a letter from his client, which he said was ‘replete with remorse’, and asked for a non-custodial sentence to allow him to continue to co-parent his daughter.
“With the challenges the young girl is facing and the fact he is of great use and support to her, it is perhaps the best way he can atone for what he did,” he suggested.
However, Judge Martin Nolan noted that he had ‘viciously attacked his partner’ and rendered her unconscious.
“The first assault was serious enough but to repeat it was aggravating,” he said. “Also, that it was witnessed by their child. Who knows what effect that could have on a child long-term? It’s far too serious.”
He sentenced him to 20 months in prison.
