Claims hot water used in assault

A man stands accused of strangling his partner and trying to disfigure her by throwing boiled water on her back during a heated argument.

Quaid Darryl Clement’s on again, off again girlfriend of 13 years told the New Plymouth District Court of the instant pain she felt on September 11 last year when the recently boiled water splashed up against her skin during an alleged assault in her room at the Te Henui Lodge on Bell St, New Plymouth.

She claimed it followed a morning of arguments with Clement over missing cigarettes and his strangulation of her while she showered.

Clement previously pleaded not guilty to charges of assault with intent to injure, disfiguring with intent to injure, breaching a protection order and common assault. His trial, before Judge Chris Sygrove and a jury of eight women and four men, began yesterday.

The woman, one of four witnesses to give evidence for the prosecution, said as she turned to switch off the shower tap, she felt the hot water on her back.

‘‘I just screamed because it was sore,’’ she said.

Earlier, prosecutor Jacob Bourke’s opening address outlined how Clement had stayed overnight at the complainant’s home and the following day an argument began before she went for a shower.

While she was doing so, Clement is alleged to have come into the bathroom, pulled back the curtain and strangled the woman for five seconds.

‘‘He squeezed so hard around her throat she couldn’t breathe. She felt dizzy and giddy afterwards,’’ Bourke said.

Clement left and returned with a recently boiled jug, which he is then accused of using to splash hot water onto the woman’s back.

Photographs of the woman’s injuries were given to the jury as part of the evidence. They showed two small abrasions around her neck along with red marks on much of her upper back. Bourke said the doctor had diagnosed them as ‘‘splash burns’’.

After the alleged assaults, Bourke said Clement left the address. When the complainant’s mother and 14-year-old brother turned up at her unit, a decision was made to go to the emergency department to get treatment for the burns.

As they drove there, Bourke said they saw Clement walking along the road. The complainant’s mother pulled over to confront the accused and it was during this altercation that the Crown say Clement assaulted the boy by twisting his thumb when he tried to prevent the accused getting into the car.

Under cross-examination by defence counsel Julian Hannam, the woman, who was quietly spoken and tearful at times during her evidence, admitted she never saw Clement throw the hot water as her back was turned.

Hannam said the accused planned to give evidence in his defence and say that the jug had accidentally slipped from his hands and fell and the water splashed up onto the complainant’s body. The room in which the assault is alleged to have happened was described as a bed-sit and the bench where the jug sat was in close proximity to the bathroom.

When Hannam put this account to her, the woman said it could have happened this way but she felt the boiled water had been ‘‘biffed at her’’.

Following the completion of the prosecution’s case, Clement was called to give evidence. On the morning of the alleged assault, he said there had been a dispute over sharing tobacco which he admitted had ‘‘upset’’ him. ‘‘I suppose you can say I was a little angry, but mostly I was upset,’’ he said.

He denied strangling the complainant and described how the incident with the boiling water had been an ‘‘accident’’.

Clement said as he picked up the recently boiled jug to make a coffee, it slipped out his hands and bounced against the nearby fridge, causing the hot water to fly out.

After the complainant began screaming, Clement said he ‘‘freaked out’’.

‘‘I told her I was sorry and it was an accident,’’ he said. The trial continues today.