Nia Gibbs-Williams thought that this time she was leaving for good.
It was April, and her partner, Andrew Beckett, had hit her over and over on the arms and shoulder. When she tried to flee, he lunged at her and bit her left ear. Nia told him she had called 999, and he ran off. She gave a statement to the police. Twenty-four hours later, they were together again.
“He played on his mental health all the time and somehow managed to make me feel sorry for him”, says the 30-year-old NHS healthcare assistant from south Wales. He had already shoved her against a chair on New Year’s Day, then blamed his ADHD and a new medication. Nia forgave him. What she didn’t know was that Beckett, 38, had 11 previous convictions for assault, intentional strangulation, and breaching restraining orders against other former partners.
Neither apologies nor promises stopped him. A month later, he kept her at his home for two hours, shouting and shoving her, until the neighbours called the police. Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court sentenced him to 26 months in prison and imposed an indefinite restraining order. How many warning signs would it have taken to stop him sooner?