A man who threatened to send sexually explicit pictures of his partner to all her neighbours has been jailed for nine months.
Anthony O’Donnell subjected his former partner to a litany of abuse after their relationship broke down.
O’Donnell harrassed the mother of his children and made more than one hundred phonecalls on one occasion as he tried to get access to his children.
The woman had to disconnect her phone because of the threatening manner and abuse being made during the calls.
On another occasion, on April 26th, 2016, he called to the woman’s home in Newtowncunningham and twice spat at her and verbally abused her.
He also sent her sexually explicit images of a woman whose face had been blurred out.
He threatened his former partner that he would send the pictures to all her neighbours telling them it was her.
O’Donnell, from Hawthorn Close in Ballybofey, Co Donegal had previously been barred from seeing the family but continued to try and make contact with them.
He was arrested and taken into custody where he has remained in Castlrea Prison for the past two months.
Solicitor for the accused, Mr Kieran O’Gorman said all matters stemmed from the breakdown of their relationship.
He said O’Donnell had been in a relationship with the woman for ten years but this had broken down and he became seriously ill with cancer.
Mr O’Gorman said his actions were driven by his frustrations in trying to get access to his children.
Judge Paul Kelly described the case as an extremely serious and graphic case of harassment over a period of time.
He said “I can also think of nothing worse than where he circulated explicit pictures which were shown to court and which he threatened to send to neighbours and then called 95 times and had to block him.
“That is beyond comprehension how someone could do that to the lady in question – but more importantly he could think of doing that where he is claiming it is in pursuit of his desperation to get access to their children.
“I regard this at the very limits of the seriousness of matters that can be dealt with in this court. He was on bail and told not to have any contact.
“It has clearly had a devastating impact on the injured party. She is very clear in how she feels this could impact on the children and she is hoping that it won’t impact because she has done everything she can to protect the children.”
He jailed O’Donnell for a total of nine months in jail and backdated the sentence to when he was taken into custody two months ago.
He also ordered O’Donnell to remain under the supervision of the Probation Services for 12 months after his release and not to go within 100 metres of his former partner.