Woman beaten in 6-hour ordeal

A South Canterbury man has been jailed for assaulting a woman over six hours while she was seven months pregnant.

Leonard Alexander Hansen choked her multiple times, hacking her hair with a knife, and stomping on her head, neck and back in a Geraldine motel room in the early hours of July 14, 2020.

Hansen was sentenced to two years, nine months’ jail when he appeared before Judge Dominic Dravitzki in the Timaru District Court on Monday.

The 26-year-old had admitted impeding the victim’s breathing by strangulation, assaulting her with intent to injure, and assaulting her with a weapon. He was also found guilty of speaking threateningly and possessing a weapon after a judge-alone trial.

He had spent the past six months in custody while the matter was before the court.

Judge Dravitzki said before the ‘‘repeated, sustained, and serious’’ motel room attack, Hansen had fashioned some tweezers into a weapon resembling a knuckle-duster and acted threateningly towards the woman on May 1, 2020.

Hansen, who had also been convicted of assaulting the woman in 2019 and 2015, was on bail for the May 1, 2020 offending, with a condition not to associate with her, when they arranged to meet after messaging each other on July 13.

Hansen accused the woman of being unfaithful, Judge Dravitzki said.

‘‘You hit her with a closed fist above her left eye. You told her if she wanted to live, she needed to give you a name,’’ the judge said.

‘‘Over the course of the next few hours, you kept her in the room and continued demanding a name from her. She believed, due to being seven months pregnant, she would be overpowered if she made any attempts to leave.’’

Judge Dravitzki said Hansen grabbed the woman by the back of the head and squeezed her neck, repeating the act four or five times throughout the sixhour ordeal.

‘‘On one occasion, you wrapped a chrome television cable around your fists and held it up to the complainant’s face, threatening to strangle her with it,’’ Judge Dravitzki said.

‘‘On the last occasion, you squeezed her throat for eight to 10 seconds.

‘‘You left the room and uplifted a knife. You returned and told her you were going to cut off her hair, so that she would be uglier than the guys she slept with.’’

The woman, terrified, begged Hansen to put the knife away. He chopped off clumps of her hair before tossing her to the floor and stomping on her head and neck.

‘‘You then stomped on her back in a way she believed was meant to terminate her pregnancy.’’

Judge Dravitzki said the attack ceased and Hansen decided to flee after spotting a police car driving past the motel.

Defence lawyer Jay Lovely said Hansen had expressed remorse in a letter to the court. He pinpointed his methamphetamine use as driving his actions.

‘‘The defendant has shown a bit of insight in respect to what led to this offending,’’ Lovely said.