A Dunedin man who throttled his partner while she held their infant child will be on lockdown at home for longer than the rest of the country.
Pavel Ian Douglas (26) appeared before the Dunedin District Court yesterday after admitting a charge of strangulation.
It was his first domestic violence charge, defence counsel Brendan Stephenson said, but the man only narrowly evaded a prison term.
Douglas was on the couch with his partner on December 20 last year after drinking throughout the night.
An argument flared up and the victim — who was holding their daughter — hit the man in the back of the head and told him to calm down.
He did not calm down.
Douglas grabbed her around the throat with one hand and held his other in a fist as she struggled to breathe.
"You’re lucky I don’t kill you right here, right now," he said.
The victim managed to push him away but Douglas throttled her a second time.
The attack was only halted when his partner’s mother took the child to another room and called police, the court heard.
Mr Stephenson said his client was willing to do whatever treatment necessary to mend his ways.
However, in a statement to the court, the victim said Douglas had talked about changing before and she was yet to see action.
She said she did not feel safe when he was drinking.
Judge Michael Crosbie called domestic violence a "scourge" and said the court was dealing with an increasing number of strangulations.
It was "somewhat brazen or cruel", he said, that Douglas committed the acts in front of the victim’s mother.
At the end of 2018 a new offence of strangulation, carrying a maximum penalty of seven years’ imprisonment, came into force.
Douglas was sentenced to 10 months’ home detention.
If the judge received a positive report after half that period, he would consider converting the remainder to something less restrictive.
