Cory James Gilliand-Dickson, 21, appeared in the Dunedin District Court yesterday after a judge-alone trial in June where he denied charges of threatening to kill, assault in a family relationship, assaulting a child and supplying cannabis.
Yesterday, Judge Hermann Retzlaff found him guilty on the violence charges, and not guilty of supplying cannabis.
On the morning of his trial, Gilliand-Dickson admitted a charge of ill-treating an animal.
The charges stemmed from incidents between January and May last year.
The court heard Gilliand-Dickson kicked a pet kitten down the hallway causing its back to break.
The kitten was killed to end its suffering, but witnesses said the next day, Gilliand-Dickson dug up the dead kitten and decapitated it using a pickaxe.
At trial, the court heard evidence about the defendant hitting his partner and her 1-year-old child.
One witness said he saw Gilliand-Dickson hit the baby on his head with a soup spoon, and described it as a "hard donk", an incident the witness’s brother also said he saw.
Both brothers also said the defendant dropped the baby on different occasions.
The younger brother said he saw Gilliand-Dickson pick the child up and drop him on his bottom, while the other witness said he saw the defendant forcefully throw the child on to a mattress.
They both claimed the defendant had hit their sister, the defendant’s partner, leaving her bruised.
Gilliand-Dickson claimed he and his partner would "play-fight" and he only had "playful" contact with the child.
He said he had a "very happy, very cheerful" relationship with his partner and an "amazing" connection with her child.
The defendant admitted he sometimes told the baby to "shut up" and might mutter swear words under his breath, but never laid hands on him.
Gilliand-Dickson said bruises on his partner’s neck could be easily explained — they were hickeys.
A bruise on her arm was there before he dated her, and she had a skin condition which could explain the mark, he said.
Judge Retzlaff rejected the defendant’s explanations, leading him to the guilty verdicts.
Gilliand-Dickson is expected to be sentenced in October.
