Jury hears woman’s screams on 999 call Manadmitsabusivebehaviourbutassaultcharge’notproven’
A witness told this week how she feared her neighbour was going to be murdered during a disturbance.
Netherton man Peter Barr admitted threatening or abusive behaviour and breaching bail conditions by contacting his former partner. However, a jury at Hamilton Sheriff Court found an assault charge against him not proven.
Barr, 37, of Clarendon Road, had been accused of throttling the woman, causing her breathing difficulties, then kicking her repeatedly as she lay on the floor.
The incident happened at a flat in
Emerald Terrace, Bellshill, on April 2 last year.
His ex told the court Barr turned up out of the blue as she was chatting to a friend.
She asked him to leave but when she tried to call the police he grabbed her phone and smashed it.
The woman said Barr shoved her on to a couch, grabbed her throat and made her “beg for her life”.
She claimed he compressed her neck “with full force” and she feared she would “stop breathing”.
Then, she claimed, in the kitchen she fell to the floor and he kicked her repeatedly.
The woman’s screams could be heard on a 999 call played to the jury.
Her upstairs neighbour said she was wakened by noise at 2am. She phoned the police because she was worried Barr’s ex would be murdered.
Jennifer McCabe, prosecuting, said there was “sheer terror and pain” in the alleged victim’s voice as she tried to tell the call handler what had happened.
Barr could be heard apologising in the background and telling the woman he loved her.
The woman said that the next day she had two black eyes and multiple bruises on her body.
She also lost a tooth in the assault. But defence agent Elspeth Forrest said police officers did not see any injuries on her.
Barr told his lawyer that he had been paid that day and his ex asked him to go to the flat with money.
He claimed she then went out and bought cocaine. Barr criticised her for taking drugs and she “went off on one” when he destroyed her crack cocaine pipe. The woman denied taking drugs.
Mrs Forrest admitted the woman’s screams on the 999 call “sound awful”, but suggested they were to do with rowdy behaviour and not cries of pain.
After the verdict, Sheriff Alasdair MacFadyen deferred sentence on the charges of threatening or abusive behaviour and breaching bail until next month.