A MAN whose catalogue of domestic violence included throwing urine over his wife, has won a reduction in his jail term.

Martin Lamont, 41, of Linden Avenue, Darlington, received a five-year sentence in July last year after pleading guilty at Teesside Crown Court to kidnapping, putting a person in fear of violence and unlawful wounding.

He was also given a three-year extended licence period, meaning if he stepped out of line after his jail term he could a return to prison.

But yesterday his lawyers successfully challenged the extension period as "unlawful" on a technical point, and also managed to get his jail term reduced.

After quashing the extension period completely, Lord Justice Rose added that father-of-two Lamont's sentence was manifestly excessive and cut it to three- and-a-half years.

The judge told the court Lamont, of previous good character, had subjected his wife - who later pleaded with the Crown Court to show mercy on him - to a series of attacks.

During a heated argument in the early summer of 2003, Lamont - married for 17 years - threw her down the steps of their house and told her never to return.

In September of that year, he hit a shampoo bottle in the bathroom causing it to bounce up and hit his wife, giving her a black eye.

Lord Justice Rose, sitting with Mr Justice Gibbs and Mr Justice Stanley Burnton, added that in November 2003, Lamont locked his wife in a cupboard. He would not let her go to the toilet, and after she urinated in a jug he threw it over her.

On another occasion, he pushed her against the wall, hit her head against a cupboard and threatened to throw turpentine over her face.

In March last year, after an evening out, he smashed a glass over his wife's head causing a wound, and said she would "never see her children again".

Insisting that she go to hospital the next morning, he drove her the wrong way and said she had "fallen into his trap" and he was taking her to "somewhere no one would find her".

Eventually, Lamont calmed down and took his wife to the hospital where she was treated for a cut to her head.

Lord Justice Rose said Lamont's attacks were brutal and callous, but concluded he had not been given enough credit for his guilty plea and his previous good character.