By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
A MAN has been jailed over a series of violent incidents including pulling knives and scissors on his estranged girlfriend and her new partner.
Benjamin Gowland picked up a pair of scissors as he met his ex-girlfriend to discuss separation papers at her apartment about 1.30am on 8 October, Dandenong Magistrates’ Court was told on Monday.
He allegedly told her: “If I can’t have you then no one can.”
As she tried to take away the scissors, Gowland pushed her backwards over a coffee table and into a television stand.
After Gowland had been accosted by the victim’s new partner, he drew two knives from a knife block in the kitchen.
He pressed the larger knife into the woman’s chest, causing a thin cut to her and tearing her jumper. He cut her temple with the other knife.
Gowland dropped the knives and fled after the woman’s partner held kitchen knives to the accused’s back.
The accused later told police he was acting in self-defence.
“I was more likely going to hurt myself than them, hey,” he said.
Three weeks later, Gowland breached an intervention order protecting the victim.
He was also charged with recklessly causing injury when he swung a barstool at a male who was kissing his ex-partner in a Cheltenham pub in 2009.
Gowland inadvertently hit his ex-partner in the head with the stool, rendering her unconscious.
The accused was also charged over punching several holes into a Dandenong boarding house’s plaster walls during an argument with a female in 2013.
In September, Gowland was charged with assaulting and hindering police who were called to evict his de facto partner from Sundowner Caravan Park, Springvale.
Gowland was fined $300, ordered to pay $500 compensation to the boarding house and given a 12-months community corrections order for when he is released from jail in December.
His community corrections order includes alcohol and illicit drug treatment, mental health treatment, relationship and men’s behaviour change counselling.
