A man who attacked women and a child in a string of assaults was jailed for a total of 33 months today.
Malcolm Macdonald (47) kicked and punched two women and beat a boy with a shinty stick during the violence.
A judge told Macdonald that he had shown nasty and vicious behaviour towards his female victims and subjected the boy to “degrading and humiliating treatment”.
Lord Boyd of Duncansby said at the High Court in Edinburgh: “I accept you have not served a period of imprisonment before.”
But the judge told him: “A non-custodial sentence is not an appropriate option.”
Macdonald originally stood trial facing further charges but was acquitted of raping the women and indecently assaulting one while she was in labour at the maternity unit at Raigmore Hospital in Inverness in 1994.
A jury found him guilty of five charges of assault committed in Inverness and Dingwall between 1988 and 2008.
One woman was held against a wall by her throat and thrown to the ground. She told the court: “I was scared of him. I was still scared of him when I talked to the police last year.”
During the assaults on the boy Macdonald, a former barber who went to work in the oil industry, forced his head into a sink filled with water.
Defence counsel Mark Stewart QC said Macdonald, a prisoner, has already spent about 11 months in custody and effectively served the equivalent of a two-year sentence.
“He accepts his conduct had consequences for those involved, ” said the defence counsel. He added that Macdonald was assessed as not posing an ongoing risk to the public. Lord Boyd told Macdonald that the jury had acquitted him of the most serious charges he had faced.
He backdated Macdonald’s sentence to February this year.