Paranoid Blidworth man tried to strangle his girlfriend at mum’s house

James Myers read messages on her phone while she was asleep, and woke her up to ask who "Michael" was, on April 26, said prosecutor Victoria Rose.

When his partner told him it was a colleague, Myers slapped and punched the left side of her face, leaving her with a swollen and bleeding lip.

He packed her clothes into a suitcase and, as she tried to call the police, snatched the phone and threw it out of the window.

After she threw his phone out of the window, Myers screamed at her to get out - shouting that it wasn't her house, but his mum's. He pushed her outside, dressed only in a T-shirt, but his mother let her back in.

Myers slapped his partner, got on top of her and put his hands around her throat, squeezing so that she struggled to breathe.

He stumbled at the top of the stairs and fell to the bottom, said Ms Rose. After his partner established he was all right, she called police from a neighbour's house.

In a statement, his victim said she struggled to find a place to live afterwards and the injuries left her with soreness for some time.

She alternates between “feeling remorseful and relieved that the violence and controlling behaviour has come to an end.”

Nottingham Crown Court heard that Myers has previous convictions including two counts of violence against women: one against his mother, in 2013, and another for punching a different ex-girlfriend in 2018.

Matthew Smith, mitigating said: "He has been in custody since April and has served the equivalent of a six month sentence.

"He has recognised that although the parties were at a difficult period during lockdown, and they had both lost their jobs, the responsibility was his.”

He said Myers' paranoia was "compounded by drug misuse" and he suffered a mental health episode while withdrawing when he was locked up.

Myers, 28, of Rockings View, Blidworth, admitted assault occasioning actual bodily harm and criminal damage, on April 26.

On Thursday, Recorder Richard Davis sentenced him to one year in prison, suspended for two years, with 20 rehabilitation days and a nine-month drug programme.

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