A mother was subjected to a terrifying ordeal at the hands of her violent partner during which he made shocking kidnap threats about her children.
Daniel Rush choked the woman, held a knife to her throat, poured pop over her, punched and kicked her and told her he was going to kill her in her own home. When he said he was going to get her children, she bravely fought back, throwing a chair at his face and stopping him getting upstairs where the sleeping youngsters were.
Now Rush, who told her "I get paid to kidnap kids for a living" and said if he was jailed someone else would come and take her children, has been locked u at Newcastle Crown Court.
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The court heard the victim, who lives in the Newbiggin Hall area of Newcastle, had been in a relationship with the brute for a couple of months at the time of the attack. On December 15 last year he arrived at her home and she was wrapping Christmas presents and her children were upstairs in bed.
He noticed she was talking to her friend on the phone and tried to grab it and the device made a noise, prompting him to claim it had been bugged and he ended the call she was on and accused her of "grassing" him to police for something. He left her house but returned after around 20 minutes, having consumed a quarter of a bottle of gin. The woman decided to go to bed to try to sleep, at which point he turned violent.
Neil Jones, prosecuting, said: "The defendant dragged her from there by her hair into the kitchen and put both hands around her neck and she was struggling to breathe. She tried to break free and he pushed her into a chair and put his arm around her neck in a headlock from behind. He made her sit in the chair and when she tried to get up he punched her in the face three or four times.
"She said she needed the toilet and he told her to p*** on the floor. He then poured a two litre bottle of fizzy drink onto her person and she tried to run to the passage but in doing so slipped.
"He then kicked her up the backside and threw her about the kitchen, causing a cut to her knee where a scar burst open." Things then took an even more sinister turn when he held a knife to her throat and said: "I've hurt you, you understand I will have to kill you".
Mr Jones said: "He said to her, more worryingly, that he would get her children so she then decided it must be her mission to stop him going upstairs. Her attempt to stop him was successful. She threw a chair at him and it hit him, causing his face to bleed. He later attended the RVI for that to be treated.
She managed to get her phone from him and contacted her dad and police to raise the alarm but was terrified as she tried to stop him going upstairs. He told her: "I get paid to kidnap kids for a living." Mr Jones said: "This was something that troubled her more than considerably."
Even after her parents arrived, Rush continued to make disturbing threats, saying: "If I go back to prison someone is going to take your kids. They are not the sort of people you want to **** with, they will put your door in and take your kids."
In a victim impact statement, the woman, who suffered extensive bruising all over her arms and legs, said: "I don't want to be here anymore, I'm frightened for myself and my children. He has mentioned people would come and take my kids and I believe he knows people who would do this.
"I'm afraid if I leave the house someone will kick the door in and take the kids. My kids were in the house at the time and I believed he was going to try to kill me and get to my kids and I had to protect them.
"I'm afraid he or other people will try to get to me or my kids and I don't feel safe in my home."
Rush, 28, of Bracken Place in Fenham, who has 32 previous convictions, pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and assaulting two emergency workers after attacking police after his arrest, including spitting and headbutting them. He was jailed for a total of 18 months and given an indefinite restraining order by Recorder Mark Giuliani.
Brian Hegarty, defending, said: "He has expressed remorse and given an explanation about why this happened. He wishes it had not happened. The threats were empty threats, unpleasant though they were."
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