Timothy Russell scolded by magistrate for choking ex-partner unconscious

A man has been torn to shreds by a magistrate after choking his pregnant ex-partner and leaving her with facial fractures in a Dubbo motel.

A soon-to-be father who choked his pregnant partner unconscious at a motel will remain behind bars after he was sentenced in Dubbo Local Court on Thursday.

Timothy Russell, 26, appeared via video link from Goulburn Correctional Centre after he was arrested by Dubbo police on February 24 and charged with domestic violence related assault occasioning actual bodily harm and damage property.

Documents tendered to the court reveal Russell was in a relationship with the victim who was six weeks pregnant before the incident.

On the evening of February 23, Russell was staying with the victim at the Across Country Motor Inn on Whylandra St in Dubbo while they were searching for a home.

About 6.40pm, the victim was sleeping in the bed when Russell pulled the blankets from the bed and demanded for her to get up and leave the room, while taking her mobile phone.

In an attempt to get the phone back and call a family member for help, he grabbed a gold chain necklace from around her neck and pulled it, causing it to break.

The pair started wrestling for the phone, before Russell threw the victim against a lounge and then on to the floor.

“(Russell) placed hands around the neck of the victim while she lay on the floor,” police facts state.

“At this time (Russell) was using his body weight to hold down the victim. The victim yelled for help to no avail.”

Because of the victim’s airway being restricted by Russell’s hands, she lost consciousness for a “few seconds”.

The victim was also bleeding from the lip after a small laceration.

After struggling, she eventually freed herself from Russell before being thrown on to the bed, and being held down by the weight of his body.

“(Russell) held the victim’s head to the side and punched the victim with a closed fist to the face, forehead and nose … a number of times,” police facts state.

“As a result of the punch to the nose the victim began to bleed from her nose.”

Russell ran away, hiding in a vehicle as the victim left the room and requested help from the motel manager, who contacted police.

The woman was left with pain to her back, chest, shoulders, teeth, nose and forehead, along with bruises to her eyes and neck, red marks to her shoulders, lumps on her forehead and later diagnosed with a mild nasal bone and septal fracture.

Paramedics treated her at the motel before she was taken to Dubbo Base Hospital.

The victim later provided an almost 16-minute statement to police.

The next day, about 8.30am, police attended a unit on Bishop St in Dubbo to try and locate Russell and despite no answer on the door, officers busted him inside the upstairs shower.

The court heard from Russell’s lawyer that despite his client serving an intensive corrections order for common assault, it was the first matter of domestic violence on his record.

Russell’s lawyer pointed to a “particular context” of the offence, highlighting that his client recently moved to Dubbo from Sydney to be closer to the victim’s family.

Subsequently, Russell had become disconnected from his own family and mental health support, given he has been diagnosed with schizophrenia and he fell back into drug use which he has struggled with since he was 18.

However, Russell’s lawyer said that since being entered into custody, he has engaged with medical support, and is back on medication to address his issues and showing remorse for his actions.

The court heard that there are positive prospects for Russell to return to the community, and that he is looking to gain employment when released.

Russell’s lawyer continued saying his client’s period in custody has been onerous given he has spent 78 days in lockdown from either having Covid or fellow inmates catching the virus.

“He gets out of a cell once a week,” Russell’s lawyer said.

Russell’s lawyer requested for the sentence to be backdated to when he was refused bail in February.

Magistrate Greg Grogin was stern in his assessment of Russell’s attack, saying “there is no reason, no excuse or justification for an assault on someone like this”.

“A message needs to be sent to Mr Russell and the community,” Magistrate Grogin continued.

“There is far too much DV in NSW (and) too many people being charged with DV … this court will not allow for DV to be normalised.”

Magistrate Grogin told the court that Russell needs to be rehabilitated and when given the opportunity in the past, he hasn’t been willing to put “sufficient effort” into doing so.

Russell was convicted and handed a community corrections order for 18 months for damaging the gold chain.

He was handed a sentence of 24 months full time imprisonment with a non-parole period of 16 months, backdated to February 24.