Jealous ex in terrifying hammer attack on Leeds family home
Judge said young man “needs to grow up”
A hammer-wielding jealous thug who refused to leave his ex alone tried to smash his way into her home where her children were asleep.
Alfie Brake was with two other men when they targeted the terraced home in East End Park in the middle of the night.
It was the culmination in a campaign of pestering in which he tried to call her 34 times in the space of two hours.
Having been arrested and bailed for that incident, he then went on to attack another woman with whom he had started a relationship.
The 20-year-old was jailed at Leeds Crown Court this week.
The court was told that Brake and the first victim had been an an “on/off” relationship but she had ended it when he turned violent, pinning her up against the wall and threatening to hit her.
But he refused to leave her alone and would continue to contact her, often when he was drunk or taking drugs.
In the days leading up to the hammer attack in July 2023, he kept trying to call her.
At around 2.45am on July 8, he rang her from a withheld number.
After she failed to pick up, he tried again and she did answer, telling him to leave her alone.
He rang again at 3.10am and her partner purposely answered to tell Brake to stop calling. Brake offered him to a fight, which the man declined.
Shortly afterwards, Brake and two others came to the property and started banging on the door.
When the woman came downstairs to answer, she was confronted by Brake holding the hammer.
She quickly shut the door and leaned against it to stop him getting in. He then smashed the living room window and the window above the door.
By this time, the woman’s children had been woken up by the noise.
After leaving the address, Brake continued to call from a withheld number.
Brake, of Oxford Road, Gomersal, was initially charged with aggravated burglary.
He later admitted to violent disorder and possessing an offensive weapon, which was accepted by the Crown as an alternative.
He was later found guilty after a trial of suffocation and assaulting a second partner in July and September of last year.
Mitigating, Glenn Parsons said at the time of the attack on the woman’s house, Brake had just turned 18.
He said he had been on remand for nine months, and attempted to convince the judge that Brake could be dealt with in the community to help “nip this in the bud”.
He added: “If he squanders this, he has only got himself to blame.”
But the judge, Recorder David Brooke KC said it would be custody because there were “just too many offences”.
He jailed him for 30 months and said: “You have a problem with your temper, and quite frankly, you need to grow up.
“This is your chance to learn through this experience. You need to do this time, come out and change your ways.”