A woman who was punched, stomped and pushed against a wall by a senior police officer felt too scared to call triple zero after being told “all police officers would be like him”.
Jonathan Charles Bettles, 37, physically abused the victim a total of 10 times between August 2019 and August 2021 at his home in Sydney’s southwest, at the cafe where he worked and in his car.
While a serving member of the New South Wales Police, he punched the woman in the head and jaw, stomped on her left foot and slammed her into her bedroom wall, forcing open a door she was trying to keep closed.
The Bonnyrigg man also punched her on the side of the head, knocking her unconscious.
She fell to the ground as he stood over her, panicking, saying “get up, get up, get up.”
These confessions come from an agreed statement of facts presented to the court after Bettles pleaded guilty to 13 offences, including common assault, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, destruction or damage to property and perverting the course of justice.
The then-high-ranking officer used his position in the police force to prevent his victim from filing an official complaint about his crimes, the facts say.
“I know how the system works,” he told him.
Jonathan Charles Bettles (pictured) physically abused a woman a total of 10 times between August 2019 and August 2021.
The victim knew what was happening was wrong, but felt unable to speak.
“The offender had always made the victim feel that he knew the law and that all police officers would be like him and believe him over her,” the agreed facts say.
At one point, he asked her to move with him out of Sydney because he wanted a position as a regional police officer.
She refused and told him that she was “afraid of going into the jungle.”
“As if you were a hitman,” he texted her.
‘What happens if one day you hit me and I die?’
Bettles said via text messages that he regretted his actions and said he was “very ashamed and embarrassed” for assaulting her.
The former NSW police officer (pictured) pleaded guilty to 13 offences, including common assault, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, destroying or damaging property and perverting the course of justice.
“It makes me feel bad,” the 38-year-old once wrote, accompanied by four sad face emojis.
However, the violence always returned.
In separate incidents, he punched the side of the woman’s head, knocking off her earring, poured Coke on her and grabbed her sweater trying to pull her out of her car near her workplace.
“Help me, please help me,” he shouted to a nearby passerby on this last occasion.
After Bettles destroyed a $400 Napoleon makeup set by spraying it with water in her bathroom sink, she called triple zero.
Although he took his phone and hung up the call, she received several calls until he answered.
Upon learning that the victim would have to give a statement to the police, the senior officer told him to make up a “fool’s story.”
“Give them a fake name, they can’t do anything,” he said.
She went to the police station and told officers that she had had an argument with ‘John Smith’.
While a serving member of the New South Wales Police, Bettles punched the woman in the head and jaw, stomped on her left foot and slammed her into her bedroom wall, forcing open a door she was trying to keep closed.
He never apologized to her for the violence, instead saying “we have to stop being shitty to each other” in an attempt to shift the blame to his victim, court documents state.
The woman took photographs showing the extent of her injuries over the years, many of which will be seen by a magistrate during a sentencing hearing at Burwood Local Court on May 28.
Bettles is no longer employed by the New South Wales Police.