A CARLISLE woman whose partner subjected her to months of sadistic physical and emotional abuse described him as a “monster.”

Despite there being a positive start to her relationship with 33-year-old Liam Swayne, the woman said that within weeks of him moving in he had revealed his controlling and abusive true self.

At Carlisle Crown Court, prosecutor Maxwell Cope outlined what a judge said became a “catalogue of offending.”

The defendant had earlier pleaded guilty to several offences, including an actual bodily harm assault, controlling and coercive behaviour, criminal damage, threatening the woman with a knife, and witness intimidation.

The prosecutor outlined the facts.

The couple began their relationship in March of last year. The barrister said: “Initially, it was a positive relationship, but it was only three or four weeks before he revealed himself to be, as she described him, a monster.”

The defendant controlled and coerced the woman from April 4 last year to August 23, the court heard.  

On June 24, he reacted angrily to seeing that she had exchanged messages with a male she knew, throwing the phone to the floor and kicking it so hard she feared he had broken his foot.

“He was constantly threatening to stab himself,” said Mr Cope.

Repeatedly accusing her of seeing other men, he would constantly check her phone. He repeatedly assaulted her, on one occasion sitting on top of her on a bed and punching both sides of her face.

He held a knife to her throat.

He also smashed a canvas picture over her head. One attack left her with a probably rib fracture, the court heard. 

Mr Cope continued: “She would wake up anxious about what sort of mood he was in. He was always spitting at her. He kicked her so hard she thought he would break her foot and he punched the living daylights out of her.”

Swayne also threatened to stab members of the woman’s family.

In a victim statement, the woman said: “My life before I met Liam was normal. I enjoyed time with family and friends and my home was a safe space. In the space of three months, that was destroyed.

“He intimidated me every single day. I still feel scared.”

The court heard how the woman had used make-up and sunglasses to disguise the injuries inflicted by Swayne. She said she had done nothing to deserve the abuse he subjected her to and had only offered him love and stability.

“Now, I can’t live without looking over my shoulder,” she said. Even leaving he home had become “a mission.”

The woman added: “Liam broke items of my property, he broke my bones, and he broke me as a person.”

She added that she hoped Swayne could tackle his demons so that they would not destroy his future.

Andrew Gurney, defending, said nothing could excuse the abuse endured by the victim at the defendant’s hands. But psychiatric background reports confirmed that the defendant had been diagnosed with mental health conditions.

“These have clearly had an impact on his criminal behaviour,” said the lawyer. Swayne had also himself suffered “inhumane treatment” as a child and he had turned to substance abuse in his early adolescence.

“He does seem to show some insight into what he has done,” added Mr Gurney.

Judge Nicholas Barker told the defendant, recently living at Woodfield Road, Blackpool: “You fall to be sentenced for a catalogue of offences, all within the context of domestic violence and domestic abuse.

“You are 33, and within the scope of domestic and abusive relationships, your behaviour towards [the victim] stands out, in my judgement, and can properly be described as sadistic.

“You made her life a living hell.

“You reduced her life to one in which she was permanently fearful of you. You abused her physically on many occasions; you persistently abused her emotionally and psychologically.

“She described you as a monster; she is right to do so.”

He had repeatedly kicked and punched her, leaving her on one occasion with what was likely to have been a fractured rib. The judge continued: “She could not live anything like a normal life as she had done before you came into her life.

“You threatened her with a knife; you damaged her property; you behaved like a parasite with only your own selfish interests in mind, caring not the least for her interests.”

The judge jailed Swayne, whose record includes previous violence and offensive weapons convictions and a false imprisonment, for 44 months.  A restraining order bans any future contact with the victim.

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