Southern Highlands anaesthetist Dr David Bell charged with over 40 new violent charges

A prominent Southern Highlands anaesthetist accused of assaulting a woman has been charged with another 48 violent offences. He allegedly choked a woman and brandished a knife to intimidate her.

A prominent Southern Highlands anaesthetist accused of assaulting a woman has been charged with a further 48 violent charges, including false imprisonment.

Dr David Bell, 40, appeared in Moss Vale Court via audiovisual link on Monday when he was granted bail after being charged with a barrage of new offences in addition to the three charges already before the court.

The Mittagong resident has been charged with 13 counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, 11 counts of common assault, 10 counts of intentionally choking someone with recklessness, nine counts of intimidation, three counts of destruction of property, false imprisonment, and being armed with the intent to commit an indictable offence.

Dr David Bell, who works at the Bowral and District Hospital, has been charged with more than 50 criminal charges. Picture: Wesley Lonergan

Police allege Dr Bell the committed 48 offences against one victim in an ongoing pattern of abuse that spanned four years.

According to police, Dr Bell assaulted the woman 24 times from October 2017 to last September. Police allege the anaesthetist intentionally choked her without her consent on 10 occasions.

According to police allegations, Dr Bell intentionally destroyed several of the woman’s possessions, including a bicycle, chair, kitchen bench, and a gyprock wall and ceiling in her home.

Police allege the abuse escalated at the end of last year when Dr Bell approached the woman while brandishing a Japanese cooking knife with the intention of intimidating her.

About a month later, police allege Dr Bell unlawfully imprisoned the woman.

The court heard Dr Bell is a prominent anaesthetist who has been employed at Bowral and District Hospital since 2018, and had private practices at Southern Highlands Private Hospital and St George Hospital in Sydney.

Dr Bell told the court he was on leave from practising medicine pending the outcome of the matters before the court.

His lawyer told the court Dr Bell was a person of exemplary character with no criminal record.

“He is a person of unblemished character with good standing in the community,” he said.

Dr Bell’s lawyer noted the case he almost entirely dependent on the testimony of the woman, statements which he said “are entirely unsupported by any other evidence”.

Photographs that purport to show the attempted strangulation “show a bit of redness on the neck but nothing more”, he said.

Police prosecutor Peter Robinson conceded the case “will rise or fall on one prosecution witness”. However, he said the charges disclosed “a history of violence”.

The court heard the police prosecutor will rely on photographs and evidence from friends and family of the alleged victim.

Dr Bell handed himself into police on Monday to be charged with the new offences before the court.

He was previously charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm, intentionally choking a person without consent, and intimidation towards the same woman last October.

Police allege the Mittagong resident assaulted the woman about 11am on September 26 in Mittagong after he became upset about her smoking a cigarette. Police claim Dr Bell pushed her in the shoulder before he put his hands around her throat and pinned her to the wall, leading the woman to believe she was being strangled.

Dr David Bell was granted bail at Moss Vale court on Monday. Picture: Wesley Lonergan

Police allege Dr Bell then pushed the woman back on to a bed and struck her on the left side of her face before pushing down on the woman’s face and neck while she lay on the bed. According to police, the doctor continued to push the woman’s face into the bed, even after she rolled over on to her stomach in an attempt to avoid the suffocating pressure.

The court heard the alleged victim has an audio recording of the alleged assault, during which police allege Dr Bell can be heard threatening to hurt and financially ruin her.

Police allege Dr Bell can be heard telling the woman “I’m going to beat the s*** out of you” and “I wanna punch you in the face right now” in the recording.

On Monday, Magistrate Mark Douglass noted the seriousness of the allegations of violence and coercive control, but said the charges were sadly not the worst the court had seen.

He granted Dr Bell’s request for bail but ordered him to live with family on Sydney’s north shore. The anaesthetist is forbidden from travelling within one kilometre of Moss Vale except for court reasons.

Dr Bell will appear in Moss Vale court on June 27 and 28 to fight the charges.