A Donegal man who coercively controlled his partner has been jailed.
The man, who is in his 20s, coercively controlled the woman for a period of over three years.
Appearing at Letterkenny District Court, the man was also disqualified from driving for six years after being charged with several road traffic offences, while he was also before the court on a firearms offence.
The defendant cannot be named due to legal reasons to protect the identity of the victim in the case.
Sergeant Jim Collins told the court that the man – who is already serving a prison sentence for other matters 0 coercively controlled the woman during a period of dates unknown between January 2019 and September 2022.
The court heard that the man did not permit the woman to meet any family without him.
The woman had to be home by a certain time or the man would constantly ring her. Sergeant Collins told how the woman began to ignore school friends as she was in fear.
He made threats to harm himself and her and would constantly monitor her social media, questioning her activity.
The court was told that the man would control what clothes she wore and would constantly check her online banking and query her spending.
The man was charged that on dates between January 2019 and September 2022, at a number of locations in Donegal, that he did knowingly and persistently engage in behaviour that was controlling or coercive and which had a serious effect on the woman and the behaviour was such that a reasonable person would consider it likely to have a serious effect on a relevant person.
The charge is contrary to section 39 (1) and (3) of the Domestic Violence Act, 2018.
On a date in 2022, the man told the woman that he would “blow the head off” her new boyfriend. He lifted up his top and the woman saw an object which she believed was a weapon, which put her in fear.
He was charged with an offence contrary to section 5 of the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act, 1997 and with an offence contrary to section 33 (1) of the Domestic Violence Act 2018 in relation to that date..
The man is also accused of breaching a protection order granted to the woman in 2022 when he sent a large number of abusive and threatening texts messages to her. He also sent text messages from different numbers and made contact via a Facebook page.
On another date, in 2022, the man breached a protection order by sending what were described as a large number of abusive texts. On the same date, he also attempted to ring the woman five times. The woman reported that the calls and texts put her in fear.
The man was also charged that he damaged property, to wit, a road sign at Meenalennaghan, Glenties, by discharging a firearm on a date between February 1, 2022 and May 29, 2022.
He was also charged that he had in his possession, a firearm pistol (22” calibre), such possession not authorised by a firearms certificate granted under the Firearms Acts 1925 to 1990 and for the time being in force. The charge is contrary to Section 2 of the Firearms Act, 1925, as amended by section 15 of the Firearms Act 1964, and section 3 of the Firearms Act 1971.
The man was charged with, on May 12, 2022 being the driver of a vehicle which was involved in the occurrence of damage to a property and failing to keep the said vehicle at or near the place of such occurrence. On the same date he was charged with criminal damage and dangerous driving.
He was also charged with: drug-driving on March 18, 2023;’ dangerous driving on March 27, 2022; and dangerous driving on November 14, 2024.
He faced a further charge of dangerous driving and driving without insurance relating to an incident where he attempted to flee from gardai, driving with no lights.
Mr Kieran O’Gorman said his client has taken full responsibility for all matters and has pleaded guilty. Mr O’Gorman said the man was keen to get the case finalised.
Judge Éiteáin Cunningham initially sought a victim impact statement and the matter was adjourned until this week.
The man was sentenced to 10 months in jail for the coercive control charge.
He was also sentenced to 10 months in prison for making a threat to kill with this sentence to run consecutively as the offence was committed while he was on bail.
The defendant was handed a six-year driving ban for driving without insurance with three such matters before her and also a six-year disqualification for dangerous driving.
Disqualifications were also marked on drug-driving (one year), driving without insurance (two years) and another driving without insurance charge (four years).
He was fined a total of €500 and the other charges were marked as taken into consideration.
The sentence was back-dated to when the man went into custody.