A former lifeguard who tried to murder three former partners during a terrifying campaign of domestic abuse has been jailed for 10 years.
Malcolm McDougal, 43, strangled his three victims during assaults which took place over nine years. A jury sitting at the High Court in Livingston heard disturbing evidence of how McDougal punched and kicked his terrified victims before grabbing them by the throat.
Jurors heard how he applied so much pressure on their necks that they passed out. On Friday, at the High Court in Edinburgh, judge Alison Stirling sent McDougal to jail.
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At earlier proceedings, McDougal, of Armadale, West Lothian, denied any wrongdoing and claimed his victims had lied in court to send him to jail. However, it later emerged that he had already served jail time and had previous convictions for domestic violence, public disorder and bail offences.
In addition to being found guilty of attempting to murder three women, McDougal was convicted of assaulting two other former partners and one victim's brother.
One victim, 37, gave evidence in which she said she stabbed the accused. But she also told of how he abused her at addresses in West Lothian, between June 2011 and May 2013 by repeatedly punching and kicking her and seizing her by the throat and strangling her.
Another woman, 33, told how he had strangled her twice during their abusive relationship, the second time using both hands.
She said: “He just grabbed me by the throat in the living room and strangled me so hard that I lost consciousness. “He was pushing right down so that I couldn’t breathe at all. I would say (for) more than a minute for me to lose consciousness."
She also said: “He grabbed me by the throat to silence me. He was screaming in my face ‘Just shut up!’ I was flat on my back – terrified. When you’re losing consciousness it’s a weird feeling.
“Everything goes fuzzy and quiet. It’s a surreal feeling and I remember thinking I was going to die.” She added that she had “a lot of black marks” around her neck afterwards.
Another victim, 24, told how a "red mist" came over McDougal and his eyes went "a bit crazy" as he attempted to murder her. She said he repeatedly choked her and restricted her breathing during an affair which lasted nearly two years.
She said: “The first time that he attacked me it was just strangling involved and a little bit of slapping around the face. He placed his two hands on my neck – he used to say it would only take five minutes to kill someone by strangling – and continued to squeeze.
“It felt like the longest couple of minutes of my life. I struggled and said: ‘Get off me! I can’t breathe!' I sort of just blacked out, almost as if I wasn’t there any more. I recall the feeling afterwards and the pain, a reminder of the way he would squeeze.”
Asked how she felt when she came back round, she said: “Sort of dizzy, dazed. I just walked away from the situation."
She also gave evidence that McDougal threw her into a shower tray and put his foot on her throat until she was struggling for breath. She said he grabbed her by the hair and held her head under cold water for five minutes.
She said: “He was calling me a dirty s*** because he’d accused me of cheating on him. He was drunk. He’d drunk two bottles of cider – six litres in total.”
She also told how McDougal would also bite her and spit on her and often burned her leg with a cigarette lighter. Sentence was deferred for the court to obtain reports about McDougal’s background.
Judge Stirling also ordered McDougal to be supervised for three years following his release from prison.
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