A MAN who tracked a homeless woman down to a public toilet in a Singleton park choked her until she "blacked out" and then drove her around intermittently assaulting and threatening her before she jumped from the moving vehicle to raise the alarm.
Luke John Gore, 30, appeared in Newcastle District Court via audio visual link from jail where he pleaded guilty to intentionally choking a person with recklessness, assault occasioning actual bodily harm and intimidation after the DPP agreed to withdraw a kidnapping charge as part of the super callover proceedings.
Gore, who had been expected to face a trial before his guilty pleas, will be sentenced in August.
According to an agreed statement of facts, the victim and Gore became friends in 2017, and moved into a unit in Singleton together in 2019 when the victim broke up with her partner and became homeless.
After a few weeks, the woman "had enough" and decided to leave and began sleeping in parks around Singleton.
It was about 4pm on November 18, 2019, and the victim was in a public toilet at a park in Hunterview when Gore came in and demanded she get in his car.
The victim refused to go with him and Gore became angry, pushing his way into the cubicle and grabbing the victim around the throat while she was sitting on the toilet.
"The victim felt him squeeze his hands around her throat and that was the last thing she remembers before blacking out," according to an agreed statement of facts.
Gore then grabbed the victim's belongings and the pair walked out to his ute, got in and drove off.
They drove around Singleton, with Gore using one hand to drive and the other to strike the woman in the face and eye.
He also made various threats, including saying things like: "I'm going to kill you. I'm going to shave your head so you'll have no hair."
The victim was scared and didn't know what to do so she told Gore she was hungry and asked to be driven to McDonald's.
He agreed and they went through the drive-thru where staff noticed Gore acting aggressively and the victim appearing distressed. "Gore was heard to say that he was going to kick the victim's head in, that she looked terrible, that she was a dropkick," according to court documents.
And as they drove away, staff saw Gore slap the victim in the face a number of times.
As they were heading out of the McDonald's car park the victim pleaded to be taken home, a request Gore ignored.
He again threatened to shave her hair off and at that moment the woman made a desperate bid for freedom, jumping from the car suddenly and landing on the road.
She ran back to the McDonald's and raised the alarm.
Police later attended and found the victim in a distressed state, with bruising to her neck, arms and legs, abrasions to her arms and legs and pain in her neck and throat. She was taken to Singleton District Hospital while police began searching for Gore.
And despite a bid for bail, Gore has remained behind bars awaiting trial until his guilty pleas as part Newcastle District Court's super callover, a process where trials are funneled into a list and negotiations take place to reduce the backlog.
I'm going to kill you. I'm going to shave your head.
Luke John Gore told a homeless woman.
