A woman has described how the boyfriend she thought was her dream man turned her and her daughter's lives into a living hell.
Linsey Chinweefat, 32, started a relationship with Shane Costello-Collins in March 2021, telling friends she thought she'd found 'the one'. But that picture of happiness was shattered - first by their break-up, and then by Costello-Collins going on the rampage.
Things escalated after they split, with Costello-Collins turning up at her workplace, threatening to 'slice' her, and even breaking into her home and launching a terrifying attack.
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Costello-Collins, of Greatfield Road, Wythenshawe, was finally arrested after more than a month of abuse towards his former partner. She told the Manchester Evening News : "When I met him he was kind and caring, he didn't have much but he was a hard worker.
"I brought him into my home, I told my best friends 'I think I've found the one, no children, no drama, no stress, I'm happy', in the space of three months it just went downhill. To go from 'this is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with' and then for him to do what he's done."
Costello has now been jailed for 18 months after admitting a string of offences. Manchester Crown Court heard he turned up at Linsey's workplace on September 4 last year, with the 26-year-old shouting at her after she asked him to stop spitting on the ground.
He spat at her chest, and shouted racial slurs at her. He then threatened to kill her, before saying: "I'm going to slice you and leave you with marks". When she tried to leave, he threw beer over her before spitting in her face.
On September 25, he turned up to his former partner's house to apologise, before he "flipped" when she called him a narcissist and punched a light switch and a hole in the bedroom wall, prompting a neighbour to call the police.
He returned to the house on October 17, calling his ex a "fat sl*g" and asking who was with her. When his former partner didn't answer, as she hoped he would go away if she stayed silent, he broke into her home, pinning her to the floor and then grabbing her by the hair. He dragged her back upstairs when she tried to flee, calling her a "wh**e" and a "sl*g" and using racial slurs again.
He then told his ex-partner her daughter "won't have a mum after tonight". When she saw the blue lights of the police, she started screaming, and Costello-Collins put his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet, saying: "scream again, I promise I will kill you."
On November 17, Costello-Collins left his former partner a series of voicemails, calling her racial slurs, and threatening to kill her once again. Half an hour later, he turned up at the house, and tried to get in to speak to her. She called the police immediately and when they arrived, Costello-Collins tried to hide in a neighbour's garden.
When he was arrested, he attempted to jump out of the police van, narrowly avoiding headbutting one of the officers who had detained him, before spitting at them with such frequency officers were forced to place a spit hood on him. His behaviour was so volatile that he had to be placed in rip-proof clothing when he was taken into custody.
Sadly, Lindsey blames herself for not walking away earlier. "I'm not going to sit here and say I've been perfect because when he gave me verbal abuse I would give it back to him," she says.
"It's my own fault I know, I should have walked away the first time he put his hands on me but I didn't and he put me and my daughter through hell. I feel like I'm always having to look over my shoulder - that's not a life. I want to be able to get up and open my back door and windows and put my music on but I'm going to be sat with my windows closed making him think I'm not even in.
"I want to be able to feel safe, to walk to Tesco like a normal human being and do my shopping with my child. I'm not moving far away to start anew, everything's expected on the victim to move home and change her life but why should I have to because I haven't done a wrong, I'm the victim in this. Why should I uproot my child on her last year of primary school because of him?"
As he has already served almost eight months in prison, Costello-Collins will be eligible to be released on licence in just over a month's time, returning to the streets close to where his former partner and latest victim live.
Linsey says if she goes to her bedroom window, she can see the home of one of Costello-Collins' relatives, and knows he will be back in the area - which is why a restraining order against him only prevents her abuser from coming within 20m of her home, instead of the 100m that was originally proposed.
Explaining the sentence to her ten-year-old daughter has been very difficult for her, she says, as her child had to go through domestic violence counselling at school after the incidents.
"I've had to explain to my daughter that he's coming out of prison and she asked me 'do we have to move schools, do we have to move house, is he going to kill us?' She's ten, she's got her whole life ahead of her and she doesn't want to play outside with her friends in the summer, she doesn't want to do anything, she wants to be glued to me.
"He's a violent thug and I want the world to know that he's a racist. He doesn't deserve to even walk around here. I thought [the sentence] would have given me enough time to move but I'm now having to rush my application before he gets out.
"I've had two of his other victims contact me and they don't want to speak up but I will make sure their voice is heard through me, to the world we might be victims but we're strong powerful women."
Costello-Collins sentencing hearing, earlier this month, heard he was sent to prison for 18 weeks and handed a restraining order in 2017 for an offence relating to a past partner. Costello-Collins has 17 prior convictions for 29 offences, including eight offences of violence between 2013-2017.
He admitted two counts of criminal damage, assault by beating, a section 39 assault, two counts of racially aggravated harassment, two counts of assaulting an emergency worker, and breach of a suspended sentence, in connection with the offences against Linsey.
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