A violent former soldier who left his ex-partner unconscious after a brutal assault was jailed for four and a half years.
Paul McMullan was also told he would be under supervision for a further four years and could be returned to custody during that period if he breached licence conditions while in the community.
The 40-year-old repeat offender was branded a “substantial risk to public safety” and remitted by a sheriff to the high court to determine whether an extended prison term should be imposed.
McMullan’s victim had been found after the attack, bloodied and bruised and with a piece of material tied around her neck.
A judge at the High Court in Edinburgh said there was no doubt McMullan had “a history of severe, chronic and escalating violence”.
Lady Haldane said an expert report found he posed a medium risk but the characteristics of the threat were treatable by interventions through programmes in custody and in the community.
Although she stopped short of imposing an Order for Lifelong Restriction, she warned it remains an option if he offends again.
Discovered two days after assault
The former Scots Guard was found guilty of assaulting Angela Connelly at her home in Carnock Road, Dunfermline, on January 22 last year by striking her on the head, causing her to fall to the ground.
He also repeatedly struck her on the head and body, rendering her unconscious and tied the material round her neck.
McMullan, who served in the Army in Northern Ireland and Kenya, claimed the woman swung at him during an argument and he put his arms up in self defence.
He said she fell and struck her head on a radiator.
An accident and emergency doctor told the court her injuries were consistent with multiple blows to both sides of her face.
Miss Connelly said McMullan showed up at her home and let himself in to use the toilet before she felt a “huge blow” to the back of her head.
The 40-year-old said she next remembered waking up in her kitchen, feeling like she had been in a car crash.
Miss Connelly was discovered two days later by a niece alarmed her house had been in darkness all weekend.
She was bloodied and bruised and with a black ligature tied round her neck.
‘Prepared to engage’
Defence solicitor advocate Simon Collins said it was clear from an assessment carried out on McMullan he has the capacity to cause serious harm.
But he said his client was “very much prepared to engage” with interventions.
McMullan, described as a prisoner at Perth Prison, had also earlier admitted behaving in a threatening or abusive way by making threats of violence to police constables Daniel Hidalgo and Joanne McKee at Victoria Hospital, in Kirkcaldy, on January 25 last year.
He was given a concurrent six-month prison sentence for the offence.
