Abuse victim (Tero Vesalainen/Alamy/PA)
A man who choked his girlfriend because she didn’t message him after finishing work has become one of the first violent abusers convicted of non-fatal strangulation.
The 29-year-old flew into a rage when she got back to their shared home in east London.
He pleaded guilty and was handed a four-week prison sentence, suspended for 18 months, and was made to carry out 100 hours of unpaid work.
The defendant was also put on a 30-session course on building better relationships and handed a restraining order prohibiting contact with the victim.
Lisa Ramsarran, the CPS’s Deputy Chief Crown Prosecutor in London and Domestic Abuse London lead, revealed the case as research found children were present in more than a third of cases when victims - including their own mothers - are strangled.
Since June, prosecutors have been able to charge suspects with non-fatal strangulation and non-fatal suffocation offences. The CPS reviewed a sample of 32 cases to see how the new law was being used.
According to the findings, a child was present in 38 per cent of attacks and some were in the same room or subjected to abuse while it took place.
Ms Ramsarran said: “Less than six months ago prosecutors across the country began charging a new criminal offence – non-fatal strangulation.
“The physical act of non-fatal strangulation has of course always existed. Many have fallen victim to it. Many have endured its assertation of control and power that abusers use to instil fear into their victims. But now, the act itself has been recognised as a crime in its own right. This is significant for victims of domestic abuse and gender-based violence.
“We have had a number of these cases referred to us for charging by the police in London. The vast majority of non-fatal strangulation cases we have charged have ended up being heard in the Crown Court where perpetrators could face sentences of up to five years in jail for the most serious offending. This reassures me that prosecutors in London are correctly identifying the offence and are using the legislative tools available to them to effectively charge these cases and hold offenders to account.”
She added: “Even before June 7 when the new non-fatal strangulation and non-fatal suffocation law came into force, we were speaking to police officers in a number of boroughs in the capital about how to build the strongest possible cases for this new law to be a success.
“In cases of non-fatal strangulation, by the very nature of the crime usually taking place behind closed doors, the likelihood of having independent witnesses to bolster a prosecution is limited. This means we have to give real weight to all the other evidence we could present to a court.
“Often strangulation where a victim survives, leaves minimal or no visible signs of injury – in fact there is no requirement for there to be any injury for our lawyers to charge these crimes, meaning we often look beyond medical evidence to support a prosecution for these types of cases. We might look at that urgent 999 call made pleading for help, previous crime reports, the earnest account a victim gives to a friend or a family member and the observations of the first emergency responders who rush to the scene.
“In one successful London prosecution a perpetrator arrived at his former partner’s south-east London home in the middle of the night and strangled her by placing his hands around her neck. Leaving her shaken, he made off and later called the victim who unbeknown to him, was in the presence of police who had arrived at her home to take a report of the incident. In front of the officers the victim placed the call on loudspeaker and the offender’s confession was caught loud and clear on police body worn footage. In court, the weight of evidence against him meant that he was forced to plead guilty and received eight months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months and a three-year restraining order.
“In another case a victim who did not message her partner of six months after she finished work for the day, was strangled in an angry and violent outburst when she got back to the home they shared in east London. The perpetrator admitted the offence in police interview and officers who attended the scene were able to photograph the injuries to the victim’s neck. The 29-year-old defendant pleaded guilty and was handed a four-week prison sentence suspended for 18 months, made to carry out 100 hours of unpaid work, put on a 30-session course on building better relationships and handed a restraining order prohibiting contact with the victim.
“We understand the seriousness of this offence as well as the physical and psychological harm that can be caused to those who have had to live through it. I want Londoners to know that our prosecutors are engaged and ready to act. I would urge anyone who has suffered this type of abuse to come forward and report it to the police so that we can make sure perpetrators of this dangerous and serious offence are robustly prosecuted wherever possible.”
