A MAN threatened and attacked a woman who was the victim and main witness in a court case in which he was the defendant.

Although the case collapsed when she failed to turn up to give evidence, her attacker John Lawrence Coglan did end up in court to answer charges of witness intimidation and common assault.

Despite denials to both charges, a jury found the 27-year-old from Darlington guilty and he was jailed for 21-months.

Coglan, of Jedburgh Drive, was accused of taking the woman’s car without her permission after it was left parked outside her Darlington home last November.

Rupert Doswell, prosecuting, said Coglan was arrested and after the woman made a statement to police, he was charged with taking a vehicle without the owner’s consent.

He was bailed and summonsed, with a trial due to be heard by magistrates on February 17.

Twelve days before the hearing, Coglan called at the woman's home and asked if she was still planning to go to court as his friend, her partner, had told him she would not be.

But, when she told Coglan she still planned to be the principal witness, he became aggressive and shouted abuse before throwing her child’s bike over the fence.

Mr Doswell said Coglan then made threats that her house would be torched and that he wanted to “smash her face in”, before kicking her leg as a parting shot.

When police called next day she told them she feared for herself and her children, and showed an officer her bruised leg.

She later failed to attend the magistrates hearing in February and that case was dropped.

But, despite wanting to retract her statement and withdraw her evidence, she was summonsed to appear at the crown court for the witness intimidation and assault trial

She told the hearing what she told police, at the time was not what happened.

But, having been shown her original statement and told what she said in her 999 call, the jury returned unanimous guilty verdicts against Coglan on both counts.

Ben Pegman, for Coglan, said the case had come at a time when he has found good employment, working as a cladder, in Chesterfield, for which there was “on-going work available to him.”

But, imposing the prison sentence, Judge Christopher Prince told Coglan an aggravating feature was his “significant record for violence”.

The judge agreed 27 days should be deducted from the time served in prison as Coglan was tagged for a period as part of a pre-trial curfew.