Student felt boyfriend ‘was going to kill her’

A graphic design graduate has described her “emot-ional agony” after she was punched, kicked, and choked by her then boyfriend who told her he was going to kill her.

Stephen O’Donnell, aged 25, Derrybeg, Ballyclough, Ballyneety, Co Limerick, was “out of his mind with rage”, when he threatened Hilary Kennedy, aged 23, following an argument at an apartment in Limerick City three years ago.

The Limerick School of Art and Design graduates had been out celebrating the end of term exams.

Limerick Circuit Court heard how the couple began to row after Ms Kennedy walked in on O’Donnell while he was with an ex-girlfriend in an apartment.

O’Donnell pleaded guilty to the false imprisonment of Ms Kennedy at Grove Island, Limerick, on May 24, 2010.

He also admitted threatening to kill or cause serious harm to then 20-year-old and to assaulting her causing her harm on the same date.

In evidence yesterday, Garda Dino Wilkinson recalled how O’Donnell, while choking his girlfriend, said “I’ve already decided I’m going to jail” after he threatened to kill her.

The court heard how he punched and kicked his girlfriend and threw her against a wall. Standing over her, he ripped off her leggings and exposed himself while making unpleasant remarks of a sexual nature before grabbing her by the throat and choking her.

In her victim impact statement, Ms Kennedy recalled how she felt ashamed that someone she loved had beaten her and that she was unable to immediately confide in her family about what had occurred.

She described how her boyfriend had thrown wine in her face, spat at her, pulled her by the hair, and kicked her with force into the back.

“I found it impossible to protect myself. Stephen was so much stronger than me. Stephen refused to let me leave the room, grabbing me by the legs, pulling me back, and spitting on me and laughing. Stephen also strangled me, telling me he was going to kill me, a statement that still to this day makes me sick.”

She spent the months after the attack in “absolute emotional agony” paranoid, unable to trust anyone.

“I saw everyone as the same as Stephen and fell into a deep depression.”

Isobel Kennedy, defending, said her client who had no previous convictions, prior to this incident, was extremely remorseful for what had happened, describing it as a terrible situation which had come about as a result of the “ingestion of too much alcohol”.

Before imposing sentence Judge Carroll Moran accepted very “passionate things” had been said in the course of the row.

However, he said it was unacceptable it had escalated to such a level of violence where a young woman suffered physical bruising and was put in fear of her life.

Taking into account O’Donnell’s guilty plea, his co-operation with the gardaí, and his indication of remorse and otherwise good character, Judge Moran imposed a two-year suspended jail sentence on all three charges.

A condition of the suspended sentence is that he does not have any contact directly or indirectly with the injured party.