A HUSBAND who twice hit his wife on the head with a heavy hammer has been jailed.

John Michael Bland, 60, told police he needed to be punished because he was having an affair with another woman, said Andrew Finlay, prosecuting.

His wife still loves him and didn’t want to press charges as she didn’t want him to get into trouble, Mr Finlay told York Crown Court.

“I love her, I could have killed her,” Bland told his barrister Laura Addy later.

Mr Finlay said on January 20, Bland told his wife to close her eyes as he had a surprise.

Then he hit her on the head twice.

At 11.11am, as his wife lay unconscious, barely breathing with blood streaming from her head, Bland dialled 999 for the ambulance.

They called in the police and Bland was arrested.

At Fulford Road Police Station, he told officers: “It was a heavy hammer.”

He had moved out of the house because he was having an affair, but had returned on January 20.

“I need to be punished,” he told police.

Convicted paedophile Bland, of Maple Avenue, Bishopthorpe, pleaded guilty to wounding with intent to cause his wife grievous bodily harm.

“Thank you very much indeed sir,” he said as he was jailed for four years and six months at York Crown Court.

In 2009 Bland was jailed for five years for sexual assaults on children.

Judge Simon Hickey said it was “amazing” the only injuries were two cuts to the wife’s head.

“Remarkably there was no underlying skull fracture, no brain injury, no bleed (on the brain),” he said.

“She is entitled to be loved and not assaulted in this way.”

Ms Addy said: “He has no explanation. He doesn’t understand what was happening in his mind and that scares him a great deal.

“He very much wishes he could turn back time and hopes very much this will not be the last memory his wife has of their time together.”

Bland had a long history of mental and physical health problems, said Ms Addy.