An abusive thug warned his pregnant ex-girlfriend: "I will kill you before I go back to prison." Bradley Norton, 30, then launched a violent attack on the woman.
He previously hit his former partner in the back of the head as she ran away during a row. She fell down the stairs and hit her head.
Months later, after moving in together and the woman falling pregnant, Norton, from Salford, was drinking and taking drugs when he attacked her again.
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He hit her with her phone after she said she would call the police, before pinning her down by her chin, Manchester Crown Court heard.
Prosecuting, Katherine Wright said the couple met in Autumn 2021. In March 2022, they were at their shared accommodation when an argument broke out and the woman went to leave, but Norton repeatedly stopped her.
“Every time she tried to do so, he would drag her to the floor and stop her from leaving,” she said. “This happened around four to five times."
Eventually, the woman managed to leave, but as she got to the top of the stairs, he hit her in the back of the head, causing her to fall the full length of the stairs. She hit her head against a wall.
She later went to hospital. An x-ray showed she had internal bruising. She also had bruising to her legs.
The woman took photos of her injuries, but Norton told her to delete them.
In June last year, the couple moved into a flat on Gerald Road in Salford and the woman became pregnant.
“In September, the defendant was drinking a lot of alcohol and taking drugs when they began to argue and the defendant hit her,” Ms Wright added. “She told him she would call the police, to which he replied ‘I will kill you before I go back to prison’.
“She said that if he killed her he would go back to prison anyway, at which point he grabbed her phone and hit her with it.”
Norton then pinned her down on the bed, before squeezing her chin. The woman, who was 21-weeks pregnant at the time, felt like she couldn’t breathe.
Norton has three previous convictions for four offences. Hunter Gray, mitigating, said his client has issues with alcohol but was not dependent on booze.
“There is no real mitigation for his conduct towards her,” he said.
Mr Gray added that the first incident was ‘impulsive’, and said he was struggling with his mental health whilst in prison.
In sentencing, Judge Sarah Johnston said the relationship had been ‘marred’ by Norton’s drug and alcohol use.
“The probation service expresses concerns about your attempts to minimise your behaviour,” she said.
“You suggest you are being punished enough for it by the fact you have spent eight months on remand in custody. You have a low threshold for aggression and have a high risk of harm to people you have a relationship with.”
Norton, of Gerald Road, was jailed for 28 months and made the subject of a restraining order for five years. He previously pleaded guilty to two offences of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
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