Coffs Harbour man Aaron Logue guilty of repeatedly slamming girlfriend’s head into wall during Byron Bay holiday
A man repeatedly slammed his partner’s head into a tiled wall at a Byron Bay hotel before he made moves on her sister, a court was told.
Police & Courts
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A Coffs Harbour man has faced justice after repeatedly slamming his girlfriend’s head into a tiled wall at a Byron Bay hotel before hitting on the battered woman’s sister.
Aaron Logue, 40, was found guilty at Byron Bay Local Court on Tuesday of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
He was found not guilty of larceny and intimidation with the intention of causing fear and physical harm.
Logue, his girlfriend and her sister went on a trip to Byron Bay together last year, the court was told during a hearing before Magistrate Karen Stafford.
Logue and his then-partner returned to their apartment after dinner at the Elements of Byron hotel restaurant on August 5, near the end of the trip.
An altercation arose after words were exchnaged about Logue making moves on the victim’s sister, the court heard.
Logue trapped the woman in the bathroom of their hotel room.
“He was very rough and banged her head against the tiles four or five times,” a friend told the court.
The woman was bleeding from a cut on her temple, but Logue did not call an ambulance or seek medical attention, the court heard.
“She was in complete and utter shock, shaking, scared, upset,” Ms Stafford said.
It was alleged Logue took his partner’s iPhone and Apple Watch.
The court heard Logue smoked a cigar and headed back to the restaurant to eat pizza with his partner’s sister.
Logue was calm when he returned to the restaurant and mentioned his partner had fallen over.
The sister said Logue spoke for almost an hour and began making sexually suggestive comments, telling her he “picked the wrong sister”, which made her “extremely uncomfortable”.
She told the court of his proposition: “Can I come to your room? No funny business, I just want to snuggle. I don’t want to be alone.”
Logue’s girlfriend then called her sister and told her she had been attacked by Logue.
The injured woman drove to Coffs Harbour, while Logue appeared panicked and phoned triple-0, telling the sister he believed his partner was drink driving, the court heard.
Logue told the victim’s sister the victim assaulted him.
But Ms Stafford found Logue only claimed self-defence after he was implicated.
She said Logue may have believed he needed to defend himself, but his actions were “disproportionate” and there was “no reasonable excuse”.
Ms Stafford did not accept that Logue’s evidence was honest.
“(His testimony) had a ring of recent invention,” she said.
Ms Stafford took into account Logue’s mental health condition, which she found reduced his responsibility for the offending.
However, she said the court needed to send a message to the community that domestic violence was “repugnant”.
Logue was placed on a two year community corrections order, fined $2000 and an AVO was ordered for two years to protect the victim.
The intimidation and larceny were dismissed because police could not provide enough evidence.
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