A YOUNG father who attacked his partner while she was holding their baby daughter in her arms has been jailed for 24 weeks by magistrates.

Michal Czarnowusy, 25, turned on his girlfriend Anna Cook after he had been drinking at a barbecue, the Blackburn court was told.

He hit Miss Cook around four or five times, with an open hand, while she was stood with the baby, and then grabbed her by the throat.

But when quizzed by police after the incident at their home in Nelson, the victim said: “He is a lovely man but when he has a drink, he is crazy.”

The Polish national was already the subject of a suspended prison sentence for an attack on the same woman, the court heard.

Czarnowusy, of Pine Street, admitted assaulting Miss Cook and being in breach of a suspended sentence order.

Philip Hall, prosecuting, said that the couple had returned from an Easter barbecue with neighbours when the defendant ‘went crazy’ with his partner.

The police had been alerted and Czarnoswusy was abusive to officers before he was arrested.

Richard Taylor, defending, said his partner maintained there had been only one previous incident, between the pair, before the latest assault, for which his client was ‘ashamed’ and ‘embarrassed’.

Czarnowusy had completed 100 hours community service, as the result of his last conviction, and had been under the supervision of the probation service, the court heard.

Magistrates said to Czarnowusy: “The thing that concerns us more than anything is that your partner was holding a baby when you did this.”