A violent thug from Dundee who attacked his girlfriend after she dropped his mobile phone down the toilet has been ordered to pay her £2,000 compensation.
Paul Graham grabbed his then-partner by the hair, pulled her to the floor and punched her in the face, cracking her cheekbone.
The woman said she thought she was going to die as she lay curled up on the floor of her Broughty Ferry flat.
Graham, 49, was convicted of assaulting his victim to her severe injury and impairment following a two-day trial at Perth Sheriff Court.
The jury found him “guilty by provocation”.
He returned to the dock for sentencing.
Sheriff Gillian Wade told him: “This offence clearly was very serious.
“However, I take account that you were convicted of significantly less than what you were originally charged with.
“Nevertheless, you are at the threshold where custody is certainly a possibility.”
The sheriff said there was an alternative to prison.
“I intend to impose a high end community payback order, which involves an element of retribution and punishment.
“It involves some restorative justice to take account of what you have done.”
Graham, of Sanderman Street, was ordered to pay his ex-partner £2,000 in compensation, at a rate of £200 per month.
He must also complete 200 hours of unpaid work.
Sheriff Wade placed Graham on supervision for a year and ordered him to stay clear of the woman as part of a two-year non harassment order.
“If you don’t comply, you will be brought back to court and you will be dealt with in another way,” she told him.
Row over old flame
Giving her evidence behind screens, the woman said she had been in a relationship with Graham for six years.
She told the trial she was watching football at home when Graham returned from the pub on January 19, last year.
The couple enjoyed a drink and a game of darts, before things turned nasty when Graham mentioned a barmaid he used to date.
The couple began to argue in the bedroom. The woman repeatedly told him: “Get out of my house.”
She said she then picked up Graham’s mobile phone from a bedside cabinet and began to leave the room.
“I said I would give him back the phone at the front door, once he had left the flat,” she told jurors.
“He’s very protective of his phone, he doesn’t let anyone touch it.
“He jumped up and ran towards me.
“In my head I thought if I dropped the phone down the toilet, it would give me a chance to escape while he was trying to get his phone back.”
‘I was away to die’
Graham followed her to the bathroom shouting: “Give me back my phone.”
The victim said: “He grabbed me by the hair and pulled me to the floor, out of the bathroom.
“I was just trying to curl up into a ball in the hallway.”
She said she was punched in the face as she tried to get back on her feet.
“I ended up back in the bathroom and my head bounced off the floor.
“I just remember thinking: ‘Okay, we’ll that’s it. I was away to die’.”
Injury treated with frozen sausages
She said Graham went to the kitchen and came back with a pack of frozen sausages to hold against her face.
“Paul was telling me to phone the police.
“He said: ‘Phone the police and get me charged’.”
She said she did not call police that night but instead, curled up on the floor of the kitchen and cried.
The jury heard she was later treated at Ninewells for a fracture to her right cheek bone.
Solicitor Billy Somerville said Graham accepted his behaviour was “totally and utterly inappropriate”.
He said: “This was a single assault but it resulted in quite significant injuries to the complainer.”
The court heard Graham had been out of trouble – apart from a minor traffic offence – since he was 18.
