A MAN who violently assaulted his partner has been been banned from any contact with her for two years.

Barry Young, 43, was sentenced at Dumbarton Sheriff Court on Friday after pleading guilty to attacking the woman at a property in Susannah Street, Alexandria.

He repeatedly punched her on the head and body, spat on her face, seized her by the hair and struck her head on the floor of the property, all to her injury, on December 14 last year.

Young, of Burnside Terrace, Dumbarton, also shouted, swore and brandished a knife at the same property on December 11.

Defence solicitor Lauren Kerr told the court: “He is very remorseful and embarrassed. He doesn’t have any intention to resume that relationship.”

Sheriff John Hamilton said: “What a mess. You have had the jail before, you then seemed to get things right and then it fell apart again.”

He told Young he was “extremely close” to being jailed.

Young was handed a community payback order as a direct alternative to jail which will see him supervised by social workers for 12 months.

He was also ordered to do 270 hours of unpaid work by next April.

A non-harassment order was put in place until 2023.