A YOUNG mum has told a court she was battered by her hammer-wielding former partner at his Johnstone home while she was heavily pregnant.

Emma Crawford, 29, said Robert Quinn smacked her boyfriend’s car with a hammer and then beat her up.

The mum-of-three claimed Mr Quinn grabbed her by the throat and threw her to the ground, leaving her bruised, after a falling out.

And her current partner, Mark Lafferty, said she was left covered in blood after being attacked by Mr Quinn in Willow Drive, Johnstone, in May last year.

Mr Quinn, 29, now of Brown Street, Paisley, went on trial at Paisley Sheriff Court this week facing three charges.

He denied behaving in a threatening or abusive way towards Miss Crawford and Mr Lafferty by shouting, swearing, acting aggressively and making threatening remarks and threats of violence to the pair through Facebook.

He also denied arming himself with an offensive weapon – a hammer – in public and assaulting Miss Crawford.

Miss Crawford told the trial she and her boyfriend went to the home Mr Quinn shared with his girlfriend, Emma McLaren, after they had argued on Facebook.

She said he ran towards Mr Lafferty’s Vauxhall Corsa with a hammer and hit his side of the car, before heading back inside his home.

Miss Crawford said: “He tried to close the door on my face, so I put my foot in the bottom of the door. He grabbed my throat and he lost his footing.

“The door opened and he grabbed me by the arms, then flung me round and I fell on the ground.

“I had bruises on my upper arms and my bump.

“He had said he would ‘smash’ me and my boyfriend, on Facebook.

“On the way there, I laughed about his threat.”

Mr Lafferty also gave evidence, claiming Mr Quinn “could have killed her baby” with his actions on the day in question.

The 31-year-old window cleaner added: “He went into the house and battered Emma Crawford and then I went into the house and leathered him.

“He had her on the ground, beating f*** out of her, while she was pregnant with my baby.”

Mr Quinn, a plasterer, gave evidence in his own defence, saying Miss Crawford had “barged her way” into his home after she “overpowered” him.

Defence solicitor Kirsty McGeehan asked Sheriff David Pender to acquit Mr Quinn, saying the evidence of Miss Crawford and Mr Lafferty, who had to be warned about his behaviour and language while on the witness stand, could not be relied upon.

And, without giving a reason, Sheriff Pender acquitted Mr Quinn, simply saying “not guilty” when Mrs McGeehan finished speaking.