A MAN who assaulted his partner, damaged her jacket and then sent her a text urging her to drop the police complaint against him has been jailed.
Gavin Arthur Morgan, 34, committed the crimes in the latter stages of a relationship with Kerry Howe which Carlisle Crown Court heard was “stormy” with alcohol said to have been a “significant part of both their lives at the time”.
Morgan assaulted Miss Howe during a taxi journey on their way to the Hilltop Hotel in Carlisle on March 6. In drink, he grabbed her leg with such force that he caused bruising and attempted to excuse himself by saying he didn’t know his own strength.
At a different city hotel the following day, Morgan grabbed and dragged around Miss Howe by the jacket, which was ripped. Then, on April 21, it emerged he had sent her a lengthy text earlier in the month which took the form of a “script”, said prosecutor Charles Brown, that she should follow to make a police retraction statement.
At the crown court today (TUES), Morgan admitted common assault, damaging property and doing an act tending and intended to pervert the course of public justice.
The court heard at the time Morgan, of Grainger Street, Darlington, was subject to a community order imposed for previous criminal conduct, and had been battling an alcohol addiction which took hold while he worked as a chef.
“He accepts full responsibility for his involvement in these offences,” said his barrister, Kim Whittlestone.
Jailing Morgan for eight months and imposing a restraining order which bans him from contacting Miss Howe for five years, Recorder Michael Hayton QC told him: “As far as you are concerned, she is part of your past, not your future. This is poor behaviour. Don’t repeat it.”
