Rapist who put his victim in cage and treated her like a dog jailed for more than 13 years

A rapist who put his victim in a cage and treated her like a dog in a violent tirade of sexual abuse has been jailed for more than 13 years.

Connor Jay McLachlan, 28, from Port Talbot, Wales, undermined the woman’s self-esteem so much that she was convinced he would be cleared of all charges against him.

Instead, the 28-year-old was found guilty of 11 charges, including rape and sexual assault, following a trial at Swansea Crown Court.

Every time the woman tried to end her relationship with McLachlan, he bombarded her with messages, showed up at her door, refused to take no for an answer and spread messages about her on social media.

Despite the physical, emotional and sexual abuse, his victim, who must remain anonymous for legal reasons, said his constant manipulation and control meant: ‘It was easier to live with the abuse than to get the response from him. It was easier to just keep your mouth shut.”

McLachlan isolated his victim from her family and friends, encouraged her to move to an area away from her support systems and blamed her for the violence he inflicted on her.

He made her believe that it was her fault that he couldn’t control himself, that it was her fault that he would beat and rape her and that she deserved to be forced to behave like a dog and be spit on.

It was only after a traumatic incident in which she lost a baby during pregnancy and McLachlan shouted at her that she decided she could no longer tolerate the abuse.

She successfully shut him down for two weeks, but the day she returned to her house he showed up and tried to break in.

The woman said: ‘Then I reported it because I thought, ‘He’s going to kill me.’

McLachlan was arrested in September 2023. In March he was found guilty of controlling or coercive behavior; intentional strangulation; four counts of damaging property; assault causing actual bodily harm; sending a letter to cause distress; two counts of sexual assault; and rape.

He was found not guilty of two further counts of intentional strangulation and rape. On April 25, he was sentenced to 13 years and three months and given a rare lifetime restraining order banning him from contacting his victim. He will serve at least 10 years in prison before being eligible for release.

Despite the prison sentence, the victim says she is still terrified of her ex-partner. She said: ‘I can’t sleep, my anxiety is terrible. I keep getting flashbacks. I am [still scared], I know that when he says something, he means it. Even now that he is in prison, he has told people that he will wait until he gets out.”

In addition to physical violence, McLachlan was convicted of controlling or coercive behavior, something his former partner started doing almost immediately.

She said: ‘He immediately started checking me out. He would grab my phone, reply to my friends’ messages, or message people so we wouldn’t talk. To be honest, I didn’t notice it much at first. Other people told me things about him and I brushed it off.

‘I think you just have to learn to live with it. It got worse when I moved here because I was away from everyone, I had no friends and wasn’t allowed to see anyone.

‘He completely isolated me. If I wasn’t with him, he would call me non-stop and I would have to answer him. I should answer him right away. If I didn’t, he’d come here to kick off and I’d have to put the kids to bed so they wouldn’t see it.’

The woman claimed that one of the physical attacks even took place in public.

She recalled: “He hit me one night after we had been drinking. He dragged me by my hair, strangled me. I thought he was going to kill me on the street near my house. He didn’t mind being in public.”

The victim continued, “I used to push him. At one point he had a machete to my hair and said he was going to kill me. He just wanted more and more from me.

‘He took my phone and keys from me and hid them so I couldn’t leave. I tried to get out of the window, but he dragged me back inside. When we went to bed, that was the moment [rape] happened.’

After a violent incident, she was forced to walk home to her property, covered in bruises, torn clothes and without a phone. She said: ‘It was humiliating. He could have taken me, but he wanted the humiliation of it.”

In videos shared with a reporter, McLachlan can be seen ripping the woman’s Ring doorbell camera off the wall and smashing it. Voice recordings show him shouting aggressively at her. You can hear him shouting that she has options “to help herself” from his abuse by complying.

The victim said: ‘He wanted to kill me. They were always the same eyes and I even have a scar now. And he bit my nose, so I have a scar there. My whole body was covered, he ripped out all my hair.

“It got to the point where it was every other day to every day. He put me in the kitchen and made me act like a dog. He spit on me, put me in the cage and treated me like a dog.”

She said her injuries meant she rarely left the house, sometimes only doing so to take her children to school. She added: “I took the kids to school and came straight back, and that was my day. I couldn’t take the kids to school when I was black and blue. I lied to everyone.”

McLachlan’s threatening messages included rants such as: ‘You have options here now to help yourself. Help me to help you, because I can’t control myself, as you already know. I won’t turn around, nothing will stop me. So call me now, while I’m still calm, before I lose my head.’

Recalling the five-day trial at Swansea Crown Court in March, the victim said he was ‘petrified’. She said McLachlan laughed from the dock, prompting the judge to emphasize his lack of responsibility and remorse.

The woman added: ‘It traumatized me so much. I went to court behind a sign because I didn’t want to see his face, but I wanted the jury to see how small I was compared to him. It was scary to be in the same room as him, I didn’t want to be near him.’

Speaking about the verdict, she said: ‘I was quite stunned because he blamed me so much that I thought he would get away with it.

‘He knocked so much confidence out of me. The amount of self-doubt and lack of confidence I have. I think if she didn’t come to my house that day, I would still be standing in the corner crying.

“I just want people to know who he is and what he is and prevent this from happening to anyone else.” And because I also have to get over it and realize that it wasn’t my fault. I also want to help other people.’