A woman used a translator app to tell her son's teacher that she was in danger as her abusive husband waited for her outside the school. Sobhan Azizi, 33, had attacked his wife repeatedly with a metal pole the previous night.
The woman, who had been married to her abuser for ten years, was unable to leave her home except to do the school run. Azizi would demand access to her phone so he could see her location and, before attacking her with the weapon, he warned her "this is for you", reports the Manchester Evening News.
Azizi launched a brutal attack on October 5, 2022; punching and kicking the woman before hitting her repeatedly with the pole. The vicious assault left her with bruising over her body, Minshull Street Crown Court heard.
The next morning, as she dropped her child off at school, she found a teacher. Using a translator app on her phone, the woman told her: "I'm in danger, please help me, please contact the police." The husband admitted assault occasioning actual bodily harm and intentional suffocation. He was jailed for a year and 10 months.
The court heard he moved from Iran to the UK in 2020 as an asylum seeker and was granted leave to remain for five years, before he applied for his wife and child to move over.
Nicholas Roxborough, prosecuting, said: "The victim was only able to leave the house when taking her child to school. He would have her phone and turn the location services on, sharing it with himself. A few days before he bought a metal pole, two inches thick, and showed it to her, telling his wife 'this is for you'.
"The defendant said he was going to beat her, and he began to follow through with that, kicking and punching the complainant before hitting her with the metal pole. He also placed his hand over her mouth. She said she couldn’t breathe and got a pain in her chest."
Azizi claimed he put his hand over his wife's mouth to stop her shouting at him. As she dropped off her child the next morning, scared she was going to be attacked again, she made the "brave decision" to raise the alarm.
Mr Roxborough added: "She found a teacher and using an app on her phone to translate the conversation, told her 'I'm in danger, please help me, please contact the police'. The teacher alerted the safeguarding lead, who said it was clear she was visibly upset and shaking.
"They took her phone, which was ringing, and it became apparent that the defendant was ringing her. The phone did not stop for five minutes. A short time later they observed the defendant loitering around outside the school gates appearing agitated and peering into windows."
Azizi was arrested by police and told officers he tracked her location as she was new to the country and often 'got lost'. Mitigating, Constance Halliwell said he was 'deeply remorseful and regretful'.
"He was in a paranoid state of mind as a result of coming to this country and changing religion," she said. "He was threatened by Muslim members of the family and faced persecution. There was significant trauma as a result of his escape from Iran, the same trauma for his wife."
Judge Recorder Andrew Mcloughlin said: "And the link between this persecution and hitting his wife with a metal pole is?" Ms Halliwell said: "There is no link, Your Honour. That's purely an explanation of his background and state of mind at the time."
Recorder McLoughlin said: "It's clear to me that the placement of those injuries mean that you repeatedly struck her with that metal pole and have I have concluded that this was a prolonged assault. She had to go to her children's school and seek refuge." He was made the subject of a restraining order banning him from contacting his wife for seven years.
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