A MAN punched his partner on the side of the head so hard she had to crawl to the safety of a neighbour’s home, a court has heard.

Thomas Brooks, 32, and the woman had each consumed 3L of Frosty Jack cider ahead of the incident and Dumbarton Sheriff Court was told the attack appeared to be entirely out of the blue.

The couple had been living together in Graham Road, Dumbarton, for about eight months leading up to the March 7 assault.

They had been drinking together in Dumbarton and then returned home with a friend for a few hours. When the friend left, Brooks and the woman were lying on a bed watching TV.

Fiscal depute Emma Thomson said: “There was no argument at the time. At 7.45pm, they were still on the bed.

“The woman was struck on the left side of her head. It appears there was no warning.

“That caused her to fall to the floor. When she was face down, she observed she was bleeding and started to crawl towards the bedroom door.

“She crawled out of the house and banged on the neighbour’s door.”

The neighbour phoned for an ambulance and police arrived first, finding Brooks extremely intoxicated and agitated. His partner was taken to the RAH where she was found to have bruising to her left eye and a 2cm laceration above it. It might leave a scar, medics said.

Brooks was interviewed by police and admitted it was just the two of them in the flat but he had no memory as to how his partner came by the injury.

He pleaded guilty in court to the assault at the earliest opportunity, said defence solicitor Judith Reid. She said: “He has no memory of what happened but he was willing on hearing the summary of evidence that if she said it happened, then it happened.

“At recent times, it has been a volatile relationship. The complainer has her own difficulties with alcoholism and she appeared at court a week before for assaulting him [Brooks].

“He presumes this was borne out of some kind of argument, but cannot explain more than that. He takes full responsibility for the offence.

“It’s clear from his record and this there has been yet another volatile relationship in his life.”

Sheriff Simon Pender said: “This is a serious matter which led to serious injury, which has disfigured the complainer. You have a bad record and you were placed on a community payback order for a domestic in 2016 and you breached that. I’m not persuaded I should make another one.”

He jailed Brooks for six months, backdated to March 9. He also granted a Crown motion for an indefinite non-harassment order.