A man who strangled his girlfriend after she found a secret Snapchat account has been jailed. A court heard that Derius Campbell, 22, got angry after she confronted him about the account, which was full of messages from other women.
He picked up a butter knife and threatened her and then took her mobile phone. The court was told that she later received a message from a woman who claimed she had met up with him days before.
She challenged him about it and the ensuing confrontation saw him grab her by the throat. Leaving her "gasping for air", he also "shoved" two fingers down her throat, reports the M.E.N.
Campbell pleaded guilty to intentional strangulation, threatening a person with a blade and a breach of a suspended sentence. This week he was jailed for more than two years.
Duncan Wilcock, prosecuting, told the court that the couple had been on-and-off for a number of years before the incident in September last year. The woman, 20, was at her mum’s house when she realised she had left some baby milk at another address. Campbell offered to go and pick it up, leaving his phone behind.
“She said she looked at his phone and found there was another Snapchat account and when she looked at it she discovered it was full of messages from other females,” Mr Wilcock said.
An argument ensued, during which he asked her to call him a taxi, but she refused. He then said to her: “You’ve got five seconds to ring a taxi, if you have not done it by then, watch what happens.”
She didn’t call a taxi, the prosecutor said, and Campbell grabbed her by the hair before picking up a butter knife and threatening to damage her phone. He then pointed the knife towards her, which left her "scared".
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He then ordered her to ring a taxi or he would "raise his voice". The couple went to his foster mother’s house, where he took her phone from her before returning back to her mum’s house.
While there she received a message from a woman who said she had met Campbell during the last couple of days. They began to row, during which he struck her to the head.
“He then grabbed her by the throat, making it difficult to breathe, and she was gasping for air,” Mr Wilcock continued. “He then put two fingers down her throat.”
She managed to escape his grip momentarily, before he grabbed her by the throat again. There was a baby in the room at the time, the court heard. Campbell later apologised after she told him to leave. She suffered a cut to her lip and damage to her throat.
He was said to have previous convictions, including for an offence of battery against the same woman, and had previously been found guilty at Exeter Crown Court of being concerned in the supply of class A drugs, for which he was handed 18 months imprisonment suspended for 21 months.
Graham Rishton, mitigating, said the incident was "clearly troubling and alarming" and that his client was on the "precipice of custody". He said Campbell, of Moss Side, Manchester, accepted full responsibility and accepted it was "entirely on him".
“The defendant had a difficult start in life, he was in care from the age of five,” Mr Rishton said. “He is a young man who is trying his best.”
The judge at Manchester Crown Court, Recorder Anna Vigars KC, said: “It is clear you are somebody who has got some growing up to do. You are not fully mature.
“Life has not been easy for you and you were not protected as you should have been by those responsible for your care - but despite those difficulties you have managed to hold down a job. However, you were sentenced to a suspended sentence in Exeter last year, and I have no doubt the judge in that case also considered your youth and background.”
Campbell, of Selworthy Road, was jailed for two years and three months after the judge activated part of his suspended sentence.
