A JUDGE has jailed a 31-year-old Carlisle man who flouted a restraining order by repeatedly trying to contact his former partner through her friend.

Daniel Norman had denied the offence, but he was convicted after trial before magistrates. At Carlisle Crown Court, he tried but failed to overturn the conviction.

After hearing evidence, Recorder Neville Biddle told the defendant, of Shadygrove Road, Carlisle, that he had tried “wriggle his way around” the law to avoid being punished.

But evidence showed that he contacted his former partner’s friend in a clear attempt to generate contact with ex-partner, said Recorder Biddle.

Mark Shepherd, for Norman, said the defendant had suffered a “significant childhood trauma”.

The lawyer said that while in Durham Prison the defendant had helped to save his cell-mate’s life after he contracted Covid-19, alerting the authorities when officials had failed to recognise how unwell the man was.

Jailing Norman for six months, the Recorder told him: “You have a number of previous convictions for breaching restraining orders and harassment and that kind of thing. We’ are not having the wool pulled over our eyes."