A vile domestic abuser who treated his partner as his 'property' boasted that his court sentence would be 'light work' before he was locked up for 31 months.
Liverpool Crown Court heard on Thursday how Rogers, also known as James Heckingbottom, had been with his victim since 2020. She described their relationship as 'violent and abusive'. with his 'extremely jealous, paranoid and controlling behaviour' ultimately leaving her 'in fear for her life'. She retaliated by hitting him to the left ear, after which he grabbed her hair and she took hold of his. The pair spent the next five minutes tussling in the living room, leaving her with scratch marks and a black eye from where he had elbowed her in the face.
On September 30, he appeared outside her flat on Stanley Street in the city centre and began 'constantly' calling her 'every 10 minutes or so' from the early hours onwards from a withheld number - ringing her more than 100 times throughout the day. When she answered, he 'demanded to see her'. In a statement which was read out to the court on her behalf, his ex outlined how she was 'not able to properly grieve for her dad' as a result of his actions. She added: "I now have no self esteem and no confidence, I don't trust anyone and believe everyone wants to hurt me.Rogers also fell to be sentenced over an incident at around 5.15pm on September 25, when he was seen riding an off-road motorbike in St Helens.
"He is broken hearted that this is the result of his first serious relationship. He accepts that his behaviour was unacceptable and wrong. Sentencing, Recorder Richard Pratt KC said: "These offences reflect a highly abusive relationship in which you manipulated and abused, in so many different ways, your former partner. You did so when she was not wanting anything to do with you, consistently and incessantly, using your telephone - on one day alone, you tried to speak to her on 100 separate occasions.