The Electric New Paper :
Charged with shoving phone down lover's throat
He claims she swallowed it
She says she can't remember
IN a bizarre case of assault in the US state of Missouri, the facts
are not being disputed: During an argument with her boyfriend,
25-year-old Melinda Abell ended up with a handphone shoved down her
throat.
28 July 2006
IN a bizarre case of assault in the US state of Missouri, the facts
are not being disputed: During an argument with her boyfriend,
25-year-old Melinda Abell ended up with a handphone shoved down her
throat.
But how it got there is another question.
Prosecutors have charged her boyfriend, 24-year-old Marlon Brando
Gill, with first-degree assault, saying that he forced the phone
down her throat because he was angry and jealous.
But Gill's lawyers have argued that Miss Abell swallowed her phone
intentionally because she didn't want Gill to find out who she had
been calling.
According to US papers, Miss Abell told police that on 23 Dec last
year, Gill dragged her out of her home in Blue Springs, Missouri,
and forced her into his car. As they were driving, they got into a
heated arguement, with Gill screaming at her asking to see her
handphone.
That was when the phone got lodged in Miss Abell's throat.
She was taken to a hospital where doctors removed the phone using a
'pincer' tool. Doctors also told her father that she could have
died if she hadn't gotten to the hospital so quickly.
So far, Miss Abell has given inconsistent accounts of what happened
before she was taken to a hospital. She testified on Tuesday - the
first day of Gill's trial - that she could not remember how the
phone got in her throat, saying she had too much to drink that
night.
She said that she could not recall writing a statement to police
after the incident, in which she said: 'I think he thought I'd been
talking to other guys...He took my phone to see who I had been
calling.'
She added in her statement: 'If I didn't want him to see my phone,
I would have just thrown it out the window and busted it.'
Much of her testimony centred on her relationship with Gill, which
started in 2004.
'It was good at first, then it got rocky,' Miss Abell said.
She testified that he had verbally and physically abused her, but
under cross-examination she acknowledged she never told police
about the abuse and continued to live with Gill until the handphone
incident.
The trial continues. - AP. 
