A MAN who tried to get his estranged wife to drop allegations of violence against him has been jailed for 16 months.

Clive Holloway wrote letters containing veiled threats after she had told the police about a number of alleged assaults.

But even though it was decided not to prosecute the 49-year-old for those matters, he has still been jailed for perverting the course of justice.

Holloway, who also uses the surname Hayward, had been accused of ‘assaulting, belittling and terrorising’ his wife over a number of years.

The mother-of-three had made a complaint to the police and was spoken to by investigating officers.

Rob Welling, prosecuting, told Swindon Crown Court last Thursday: “While the defendant was released on bail by the police he then approached his wife.”

He said he met up with her outside Debenhams in Swindon, where she lives, in February and then spoke to her on the phone.

“The most serious aspect is he wrote two long and rambling letters to her,” he told the court.

“They are long, they are repetitive, they make it clear under veiled threats that if she does not withdraw or does not prevent him from being convicted then there will be consequences for her by him for saying things about him.

“It is plain from these letters it is a man exercising the same kind of alleged bullying behaviour as he has used, over many years in the family set up and the marriage.”

Holloway, who gave the court his parents’ address in Cromwell Road, Devizes, pleaded guilty to doing an act tending or intended to pervert the course of justice.

Chris Smyth, defending, said there had also been proceedings in the family court and he was now subject to a non-molestation order taken out by his wife.

He said the letters were ‘manipulative rather than overtly threatening,’ and bits which may have been threatening had been crossed out.

“Plainly the letters are trying to suggest to his former partner that she should try to withdraw any allegations that have been made,” he said.

Jailing Holloway, Judge Tim Mousley QC said: “Your attempt to pervert the course of justice and your actions towards her were of course abusive, cowardly and bullying.

“They showed all the hallmarks of your attempting to control her which is frequently a facet of domestic abuse in the cases that come before these courts and other courts.”