Connor Pennell aged 27 of Vines Cross Way, Skelmersdale was yesterday sentenced to 9-and-a-half years at Bolton Crown Court after being found guilty of breaching his restraining order, rape, controlling and coercive behaviour, non-fatal strangulation and three counts of voyeurism.
He will be placed on the Sex Offenders Register and has an indefinite restraining order on the victim.
He was found guilty after detectives uncovered footage through a baby camera monitor that was saved to his phone showing the horrific rape of a woman who was trapped in a controlling relationship with him.
Concerns were raised back in July 2024 in Wigan, when officers spoke to the victim who bravely came forward. He was previously charged for battery and strangulation when a protection from harassment order was also put into place. This didn’t stop his offending days, weeks and months later and following the retrieval of further evidence he was later charged with the above offences in July 2024.
He used controlling and coercive behaviour as well as threatening behaviour to release intimate images if it was shared that he had breached his order. This was over a long period of time where his attitude towards the victim, despite her not wanting to be in a relationship with him anymore and no consent being given, became violent and abusive in person and over text.
Once arrested and interviewed Pennell pleaded his innocence and told another version of events, stating to officers that his phone would back up what he was saying. This couldn’t have been further from the truth as when they began to retrieve the data the opposite came to light of the deliberate attempts to record footage on the baby monitor of the offences which the victim was unaware of.
On one occasion, the victim thought she was going to die after Pennell strangled her. Prompting her to report it due to the fear she had on her life.
After bravely disclosing the incidents in confidence to our officers, at court the victim in her impact statement highlighted the struggles she has been through: “Before I met Connor, I was a funny, bubbly, confident, loyal, young girl, and I had many friends who I loved, and a whole family who I loved with all my heart and who loved me, I had a life and a future to look forward to. He stripped pretty much every aspect of my life away and has changed the course of my future. I’m not the same person I was.
“Connor made me re-live it all, sitting in this court, surrounded by strangers watching videos of myself in an extremely personal state that haunts me. I have flashbacks of everything he has done to me and flashbacks of the trial.
“I hope that sentencing will help other Victims of Domestic violence and sexual crimes come forward and show them that their voices will be heard, and that justice will be served.
“It’s a long road to recovery because once the abuse stops it doesn’t mean it’s over, survivors always say the bruises disappear but the mental aspect of it takes much longer and they are right, so I am relearning to love myself. I will not let him take any more of me. Connor is a danger to women and children, and I pray that today’s sentencing reflects how powerful it is what one man’s damage can cause.”
