A man threatened to kill his ex-partner because he didn't want anyone else to have her if he couldn't.

Fredrick Brett attacked the woman in front of her children and threw her out of her own home, Colchester Magistrates' Court heard yesterday.

Brett, of Harwich Road, Little Oakley, became "jealous and frustrated" on June 11 when the offence took place.

Christian Meikle, prosecuting, said the pair had been drinking in Colchester when an argument broke out.

Bar staff asked the couple to go outside and they returned to the home of Brett's ex-partner in the town.

Her three children and her daughter's boyfriend were at the flat, he added.

Brett grabbed his ex by the wrists and threw her down the hallway.

She suffered sprains to her wrists and bruising to her back.

He then grabbed her and threw her out of the front door, locking it behind her.

"He said 'you're never going to see your children again', and was saying he would kill her because if he couldn't have her no one could," Mr Meikle said.

She climbed in the kitchen window and saw him with a knife, the court heard, and believing she was at risk kicked and punched him to the floor.

District judge David Cooper said: "What you have done is so serious. Of course you should go to prison for attacking your partner in this frightful way in front of her children in her own home.

"You even had a knife at some stage during this awful matter. But I have decided to give you a suspended sentence of three months over one year."

Published Friday July 9, 2004

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