In what the chairwoman described as one of the worst common assault offences heard in the court a 32-year-old Denbigh man was on Friday jailed for four months.

Sean Williams of Vale Street in the town had beaten up his partner last October and a probation officer told magistrates at Llandudno she believed he posed a future risk.

Jean Bryson, the presiding JP, told Williams, who had pleaded guilty,  it was an extreme case of domestic violence.

She added: “Ten punches thrown, we have seen photographs of the black eye, bruising and swelling, spitting involved, you made frightening threats to the victim and her family and she had to go to A & E.”

A child had been present and there could be no idea of the extent of the emotional impact.

Prosecuting, Diane Williams said that after the attack the victim declared: “He made me feel so humiliated.”

Ten days later, however, she retracted her statement, claiming it was not domestic abuse but an argument that went out of control, and that she didn’t want Williams to land in prison.

The prosecutor said there were significant previous offences of violence, including a conviction for wounding in 2011.

Defence solicitor Andrew Hutchinson said five weeks before the incident Williams had been sectioned and was in the Ablett unit at Glan Clwyd Hospital for a month.

He had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and his behaviour had seemed to have escalated either because he hadn’t taken his medication or the balance had been wrong.

It was seven years since his last court appearance, and that was for a public order offence.  Mr Hutchinson suggested that a suspended prison sentence might be the best outcome.

After a long retirement magistrates ruled that the violence had been too serious for the sentence to be suspended.

“Probation said there was a high risk of reoffending and not a great prospect of rehabilitation,” pointed out the chairwoman.