Woman assaulted with spanner, dragged by hair and choked unconscious by Toowoomba DV thug

A gutless Toowoomba man who brutally assaulted his partner has been sentenced to eight years imprisonment for his crimes.

Exterior of Toowoomba Courthouse, Toowoomba court generic, Monday, June 17, 2024. Picture: Kevin Farmer

A Toowoomba court has heard the disturbing details of a man who brutally tortured and assaulted his partner of 13 years in a terrifying prolonged ordeal.

Jaymz Gregory Smith appeared in Toowoomba Supreme Court on Friday having previously pleaded guilty to torture, deprivation of liberty, suffocation, strangulation, three charges of assault occasioning bodily harm while armed with a weapon, and four charges of common assault.

The 33-year-old was previously charged with attempted murder in a domestic violence setting but this was dropped and he was discharged before the Toowoomba Supreme Court on Tuesday, May 13.

The court was told that between October 7 and 8, 2024, at a Townsville property Smith committed serious physical and verbal abuse to his partner.

Over an almost 24 hour period Smith punched and kicked the victim, dragged her by her hair, threw her off furniture and knelt on her head to force her face into a futon until she couldn't breath and told her “this is the end, no one can hear you scream”.

The assault continued for hours as Smith pushed clothing into her mouth to prevent her from calling for help or breathing, bound her ankles with electrical cord, sprayed her with cleaning chemicals and beat her with a spanner and a piece of timber.

The court was told at one point Smith placed the victim into a headlock until she passed out.

The Crown said the woman was later found by a family member lying on a futon, covered in bruises and abrasions and taking laboured breaths before an ambulance was called.

The court was told that the severity of the attack was such that she required two days of hospitalisation and “believed she was going to die”.

Smith’s defence said their client had experienced a difficult upbringing first smoking cannabis at 9 before moving onto heroin at 13, supplied by his stepdad. He had also suffered from depression and anxiety.

When sentencing Justice Catherine Muir took into account the extreme nature of the offending.

“Your partner is a person you should've looked out for but you chose to make her suffer,” she said.

“You clearly a present danger to society”.

Smith was sentenced to eight years imprisonment, with a parole date of June 8, 2026.

The 586 days he had spent in presentence custody was declared time served.