"You think it’s ‘a family matter.’ You are wrong."
Bradford resident Bashrat Ali has been jailed for 27 months following his blatant breaches of a restraining order to stop him contacting his wife and six children.
Ali had physically assaulted his wife in 2012. He tried to strangle her after he pushed her onto the sofa and began pulling her hair asking her for money.
Bradford and Keighley magistrates imposed a restraining order on him at that time, stopping him from going anywhere near his wife home or contacting her.
In addition, Ali was given four months in prison.
However, Ali claimed the whole issue to be ‘a family matter’ and completely ignored the order against him, once he was out of jail.
Ali then went on a rampage of breaches which attracted sentences too.
In 2013, Ali breached the order three times contacting her. He was then sent to jail for six months.
Then, in 2016, Ali ignored the order again and went to see his wife while being drunk and was aggressive towards her. This resulted in him getting a custodial sentence for three months.
In 2017, he once again breached the order but was given a suspended sentence.
In August 2018, Ali once again bypassed the order and contacted his wife. He went to jail for two months for this breach.
But his breaches on November 9, 11 and 20 in 2018 were the ones that presented him to the Recorder of Bradford, Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC at Bradford Crown Court, via video link.
The judge was appalled with the “intolerably lenient” sentences that Ali had been given in the past for his constant breaches of the restraining order.
Therefore, this time around, Ali was not going to just get away with a short sentence, like in the past for his breaches.
Prosecutor Carmel Pearson told the court that Ali went to the family home in November 2018 and began shouting for 15 minutes outside the house
Then, two days later, on November 11, 2018, Ali went back to the wife’s address, when he let himself into the property.
He then confronted his wife and began swearing and shouting at her whilst demanding money from her.
She gave him £10 after which he left.
The third time, Ali again breached the restraining order and came to the house and began to frighten the children and wife by thumping aggressively on the front door.
The maximum sentence is five years in prison for persistent and serious breaches of a restraining order, Miss Pearson highlighted in court, as reported by the Telegraph and Argus.
In his defence, Emma Downing, his barrister stated that Ali began abusing drugs and then got addicted to alcohol, on which he spent all his money.
She claimed that Ali had not been violent during the breaches despite his conduct being “deeply unpleasant and frightening” for his family.
Before his trial at the magistrates court, Ali pleaded guilty to his offences.
He was now appearing by video link from Leeds prison for sentencing at the crown court.
Sentencing and jailing Ali, Judge Jonathan Durham Hall ensured he understood the seriousness of his crimes, saying:
“You see nothing wrong with this. You think it’s ‘a family matter.’ You are wrong.
“The message must get out that short sentences for persistent breaches of restraining orders are intolerable and do no good at all.”
“One of your problems is that you do not listen, and you won’t accept anything anybody says that conflicts with your own views.”
In addition to the jail sentence, a new restraining order was imposed on Bashrat Ali with no limit of time with a stark warning that the judge would deal with any further breaches.
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