Inverness teenager locked up after beating up heavily pregnant girlfriend
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A 19-year-old Inverness man who beat up his heavily pregnant girlfriend at the beginning of this year has been sentenced to detention for 15 months.
Zachary Williams, of Golf View Road, had been sentenced to 225 hours of unpaid community work as part of a community payback order.
But Sheriff Sara Matheson was told that Williams had not complied with her order which she revoked and imposed a custodial sentence.
He had been warned by the sheriff when he was first sentenced that if he did not co-operate, he would be brought back and an alternative disposal imposed.
Defence solicitor David Patterson told the sheriff he had warned his client of the likely outcome.
"He is a young man with a complex background and has difficulty in coping with life," he said. "But it has sunk in the severity of what he has done."
Williams had admitted attacking the woman in a house in the city.
His victim was 28 weeks pregnant at the time of the attack in January. The court was told that Williams repeatedly pushed her on the body and punched her on the face.
He then followed her as she tried to escape the violence, seizing her by the neck, compressing it and repeatedly punching her on the body to her injury and danger of life.
He also pleaded guilty to sending her text messages on August 1, 2022 containing threats of violence and derogatory remarks.
At the initial pleading diet, Sheriff Eilidh Macdonald told him: "You repeatedly punched your partner to the danger of life and you could have killed her."
