A 48-year-old man who attacked his girlfriend and then threatened to kill her by driving her into a river was tonight beginning a two-and-a-half-year jail term.

Robert Stewart, who ran his own plastering company before becoming addicted to heroin and crack cocaine, was sentenced at Oxford Crown Court, having earlier admitted making threats to kill and causing actual bodily harm to his 23-year-old partner.

Rachel Drake, prosecuting, said Stewart, of Tower Court, Alvescot Way, Carterton, left his girlfriend with long-lasting head injuries after punching her and holding a knife to her throat on August 17, 2007.

The following year, between May 23 and July 31, 2008, Stewart drove his victim to a chemist to pick up the couple’s methadone prescriptions.

Miss Drake said: “Having driven to an area she didn’t know, he drank her methadone as well as his own.

“They ended up near a river and he said he was going to kill her.”

Peter du Feu, defending, said: “He wishes he never met her and one can bet she wishes the same.”

Judge Patrick Eccles, who heard Stewart had previously committed 12 violent offences, said: “This is a bad case of violent and controlling behaviour towards your partner.

“It has resulted in the last physical consequences to her. You do have to learn a severe lesson.”