"Women are not the possessions of their male partners," Justice Louise Taylor said while sentencing a man who admitted raping and assaulting his partner.
The remark followed the offender earlier telling the ACT Supreme Court he understood he had sexually assaulted the victim, "but we were in a consensual relationship".
On Thursday, the judge said the protracted attack, which involved twice dragging the woman into a home by her neck, "was underpinned by a sense of entitlement ... because he was in a consensual relationship".
"The circumstance is, of course, not a licence to totally disregard the victim's feeling and wellbeing as he so clearly did," Justice Taylor said.
"The conduct he engaged in was deliberate and designed to ensure the victim's compliance."
The offender was sentenced to three years and eight months in jail after pleading guilty to aggravated sexual intercourse without consent, aggravated choking and aggravated assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
After already spending nearly a year-and-a-half behind bars, the 36-year-old man, who is not named to protect the victim's identity, will be eligible for parole in December.
The assault, previously detailed during sentencing proceedings, involved the man attacking his partner in an completely unprovoked manner in September 2022.
He dragged her by the neck into the home and did so again moments later when she tried to escape, in acts Justice Taylor described as attempts to "assert physical dominance over the victim".
The judge said the pouring of a cup of wine over her face was particularly degrading.
The man then punched the victim several times as she begged him to stop, before he raped her.
A prosecutor previously said the sexual assault was carried out "as a means of violence".
The attack stopped when neighbours knocked on the door, eventually getting the victim out of the home and to safety.
She told the court she "wouldn't be alive" without the intervention of the two neighbours.
A pre-sentence report author wrote that the man had attempted to minimise the severity of his offending.
"Claiming the victim had assaulted him and he may have accidentally made contact with her in an attempt to defend himself," the author said.
He had reportedly "only pleaded guilty to the offence on the advice of his legal representative".
Despite this, he admitted his crimes to the court and said he accepted the police statement of facts.
Justice Taylor said the man had demonstrated no remorse for his callous actions, only seeing the sexual offence "through the prism of being in a consensual relationship".
This constrains his prospects of rehabilitation, she said.
The court also heard multiple women had taken out family violence orders against the man.
- Support is available for those who may be distressed. Phone Lifeline 13 11 14; 1800-RESPECT 1800 737 732; Canberra Rape Crisis Centre 6247 2525.
