Violent husband imprisoned for a year over beatings

A FORMER charity boss who became a “slave master” to his wife when the couple signed a bizarre sex contract has been jailed for a year after lashing her with a belt in a string of violent attacks.

Scott Western admitted he was “100 per cent in control” of wife Therese after the pair entered into the sadomasochistic pact in a bid to “save their marriage” of 15 years.

The 44-year-old’s “submissive” wife went to police after three beatings on the same day at their Wester Hailes flat left her needing hospital treatment.

Sentencing had been delayed since June after Western’s lawyer told the court that a psychiatrist believed his client may be suffering from a bipolar 
disorder.

At the time, Sheriff Gordon Liddle said he was willing to look at an alternative to custody if a “credible one arises” from Western’s contact with mental health services. But he added: “This is serious and the sort of thing which leads to a custodial sentence and not a short one”.

The sheriff ordered Western to spend 12 months behind bars for the crimes.

Police caught the community worker carrying a copy of the slave contract – signed by him and his wife – to his car as he planned to flee the home.

The documents contained rules specifying sexual acts and household chores which had to be completed by Mrs Western, 46, or she faced “punishment”.

Western pleaded guilty at Edinburgh Sheriff Court in May to a charge of assaulting his wife at their flat in Murrayburn Place on June 10 last year.

On the day of the attacks, the couple were in bed when Western awoke at 7.30am and said he wanted sex. When she refused, Western ordered her to sit naked on the bed with her hands on her knees and he slapped her on the head, face, chest and stomach. He then struck her ten times across her back with his belt.

Later that day, Western ordered his wife to take off her clothes before launching into another beating after she opened a car door by herself.

At 6.30pm, Mrs Western left the flat and met with her son from a previous relationship. Terrified and in pain, she told him she had been attacked by her husband and the police were called.

Western, who lived in Murrayburn Grove, admitted assaulting his wife, threatening her with violence, inducing her to remove her clothes, slapping her on the face and body, 
striking her on the body with a belt, seizing her by the hair, pushing her on to a couch and slapping her on the face and body, all to her injury.

He resigned from his position at the Wester Hailes-based social welfare charity Community Help and Advice Initiative.