Ryan Wellings jailed after partner Kiena Dawes took her own life
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Wellings, who was found guilty of assault and coercive and controlling behaviour, is sentenced to six and a half years. A violent and controlling “monster” who subjected his late partner, Kiena Dawes, to repeated assaults, bullying and belittling has been jailed for six and a half years.
![[Portrait of man in black T.shirt with throat tattoo]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/741cee101a32d9dd55d8d951938fdb878ecc9204/0_86_1029_1285/master/1029.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
Ryan Wellings, 30, was on Monday found guilty of assault and coercive and controlling behaviour by a jury at Preston crown court. His victim for two years was 23-year-old Dawes, who took her own life, blaming Wellings from “beyond the grave” for her death. The same jury found him not guilty of manslaughter.
On Thursday, the honorary recorder of Preston, Judge Altham, jailed Wellings, a man described by the prosecution as an “entitled, aggressive bully” and by Dawes’ friends as a “horrible little bastard” with a jealous streak who did not like being answered back to.
Dawes, a hairdresser from Fleetwood, Lancashire, was described during the six-week trial as “bright and popular”, “almost universally loved”, and someone who went from being “a happy-go-lucky girl to frightened all the time”. She took her own life on 22 July 2022 after leaving the nine-month-old baby she had with Wellings at a friend’s house.
Dawes left a suicide note on her phone in which she said: “I fought hard. I fought long. I went through pain no one could imagine … I was murdered. Slowly … Ryan Wellings killed me.”. Wellings was the first person to have faced a jury accused of the unlawful killing of a partner who took their own life after domestic abuse.
