A ROYAL Marine staff sergeant who kidnapped and assaulted the woman he cheated on his wife with has avoided jail.

Brian Ncube had an affair between February and November 2021 with a woman from Reading who he met online.

However, in September and October of that year he assaulted the woman by strangling her and then kidnapped her the following month after she blocked his number.

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The 39-year-old was due to go on trial for one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and one count of false imprisonment in February this year but instead pleaded guilty.

At Reading Crown Court on Friday (April 18), the logistics soldier was handed a 13-month prison sentence suspended for two years in the hopes it may allow him to keep his job.

Prosecuting, Chris Hewitson told the court that the pair would see each other at weekends after meeting online before deciding to move in together at a property in Reading.

The father-of-two would spend ‘most weekends’ there. However, on September 26 they had travelled back from Oxford and were in the home when the defendant suddenly said: ‘Call the police, call the police.”

“The defendant was pacing up and down,” said Mr Hewitson. “He pushed [the woman] back so she was laying on the bed and he put his arms around her and choked her.

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“He tightened his grip and she found she couldn’t breathe. She made a praying motion with her hands.”

On October 10, the woman blocked Ncube’s number after he left the home early on a weekend. She then travelled to a nearby Co-op store to do some shopping.

Mr Hewitson continued: “The defendant was there in his car and he pulled up right next to her. He grabbed [her]….and pulled her hair and twisted her head so she was looking at him.”

Ncube then asked the woman to get into his car where he began to drive off. She tried to open the passenger door but he kept accelerating so it would close.

The woman alleged in her victim impact statement that he was planning to take her a lake and drown her but this was dismissed by the judge.

When stopped at some traffic lights not too far from the Co-op store, the woman jumped out and Ncube was later arrested.

The court heard that Ncube is at risk of being dishonourably discharged because of the conviction.

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Judge Hassan Khan thought ‘very carefully’ about suspending the sentence in the hopes it could help Ncube keep his role. “You’ve been given an opportunity here today,” he said.

Ncube, of Stockingway Close, Plymouth, was also given 200 hours of unpaid work and 40 days rehabilitation activity.