Southwick man jailed for attacking girlfriend and posting explicit pictures

A Southwick man punched and kneed his teenage girlfriend in the face, leaving her with a 2in scar over one eye.

He also posted explicit pictures of her on Snapchat and when she begged him to take them down he laughed, a court was told.

Bobby Harcourt-Brown, 22, later attacked the girl again, when she and a friend went to his home, pouring paint over the pair.

At Hove Crown Court yesterday (Friday 18 August), he was jailed for two years and three months by District Judge Tessa Szagun.

She accepted that he was grieving his mother’s death during a volatile on-off relationship with the girl, who is now 17.

But the judge said that Harcourt-Brown, although vulnerable himself, had carried out a persistent campaign of offending against the girl who was also vulnerable.

Emma Smith, prosecuting, said that Harcourt-Brown was arrested after he attacked the girl, who was 16 at the time, in October last year.

While on police bail for the assault, for which she had stitches, Harcourt-Brown hacked into at least one of her online accounts.

Miss Smith said that he made copies of pictures and videos – “some of which were of an extremely intimate nature”.

He threatened to post them publicly and later did so, posting two videos on his own Snapchat account, tagging her and causing her distress.

In a statement read to the court, the girl said that he sent them to all his contacts, adding: “This devastated me.

“He knew I was in hospital and did it anyway. I begged him to remove the messages and he just laughed.

“Bobby was arrested three times during the few months of our relationship. He would call me in breach of bail. Bobby has called me from prison and sent me videos of himself.”

Miss Smith said that a few weeks later, in February, the teenager and a friend went to Southwick to buy some cannabis and Harcourt-Brown saw them.

She said: “The defendant hit her on the head four or five times. She felt dizzy and sick. A member of the public chased him off.”

They went to his home to see if he was in because they wanted to report the assault to the police, the court was told.

Miss Smith said: “He came out with a hammer and chased them. Then he went back in and got a bucket of grey paint and threw it over them.”

Harcourt-Brown’s ex-girlfriend went to Worthing Hospital for treatment.

Just over a week later, Harcourt-Brown saw her at a bus stop and confronted her.

Miss Smith said: “The defendant kicked her to her legs repeatedly and pushed her to the ground.”
She suffered cuts and grazing.

Andrew Stephens, defending, said “This relationship was clearly unhealthy and clearly damaging (and) his issues clearly came to a crescendo during this relationship.

“It’s clear that Mr Harcourt-Brown has a lot of learning to do on how to be in a relationship. He has some issues understanding his own behaviour. He has realised that what he has done is wrong.”

The girl had said unkind things about Harcourt-Brown’s mother.

Mr Stephens said that he shared sexual images “just after he had held his mother in his arms as she died” and he added: “He was in a mental crisis of his own.

“It doesn’t justify what he did but it may help to explain it. He was messed up at this stage. He was on bail but (his ex-girlfriend) came to his address.”

The judge jailed Harcourt-Brown for 19 months for the assault which left her scarred. She said: “She suffered a significant cut above the eyebrow, bleeding from the nose and swelling to the lip.

“She now has a scar above the eyebrow of at least 2in in length.

“You tagged her in two private sexual videos of her, giving access to all of your contacts. When she begged you from her hospital bed to take them down, you refused and laughed.

“The threats (to share the images) were followed up when you knew the victim was extremely vulnerable and obviously intended to maximise her distress and humiliation.”

He was jailed for eight months for sharing the sexual images, to be served consecutively.

Judge Szagun imposed an indefinite restraining order on Harcourt-Brown and ordered him to pay £250 in compensation to the girl.