AN alcohol-fuelled attacker who held his petrified partner hostage after breaking into her home has been jailed for 18 months.

Bournemouth Crown Court heard how Donna Smithers had woke in terror to find Christopher Gudge standing over her, slapping her face.

Prosecutor Heather Shimmen said Gudge, 36, of no fixed abode, had used a ladder to enter Ms Smithers’ home in the East Howe area of Bournemouth, through an open window, in the early hours of March 31 this year.

Following an argument the previous evening, the couple had gone their separate ways and Ms Smithers had returned home alone, locking her door.

She asked Gudge to leave her bedroom but he refused, continuing to punch and hit her.

Ms Shimmen added: “He tried to make her apologise. She did and he still hit her, knocking her to the ground.

“He put his foot on her head and tried to strangle her. He had his hands around her throat and she was choking. She thought she was going to die.

“Her eye was bleeding and there was blood on the sheets.

“She was kept in the bedroom for nearly an hour and forced to urinate in the room which caused her great shame and embarrassment.”

Eventually Miss Smithers, who suffered two black eyes and other facial injuries, made her escape and fled screaming and partly dressed to a friend’s home nearby.

Gudge was arrested on April 1 and admitted assault, causing actual bodily harm.

In his defence, the court heard that he had entered an early guilty plea, been ‘incredibly drunk’ and ‘was now at a loss to explain why he had behaved in such an appalling way’.

Sentencing Gudge, Judge Samuel Wiggs told him: “This is just about as bad a case of actual bodily harm as one can imagine. You broke into Ms Smithers’ own home; in the middle of the night. You degraded her for about an hour.”

He imposed a restraining order banning Gudge from making contact with Ms Smithers.