A Canberra woman was bruised, burnt and bleeding after her then-boyfriend kicked her, stabbed her and pressed her bare skin against a heater when he "became angry" she refused sex, court documents said.
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The woman's doctor alerted authorities after she went to him with a black eye and spoke of her partner's continuing abuse, but told him: "[He] will kill me if he knows I've reported him to police."
The Reid man, 32, was set to fight the allegations at hearing in the ACT Magistrates Court, but instead pleaded guilty on Thursday to five charges including assault, intentional wounding and assault causing actual bodily harm.
Court documents said the woman could hardly walk and had a bruise on her cheek when she showed up to a friend's house one night and said her partner got angry with her one night last August.
She said he slapped her across the face, knocking her to the ground, before he jumped on her back and held her lower back against a heater.
The victim picked up a knife to defend herself but he grabbed it and stabbed her in the shin and kicked her legs.
She showed her friend two burn marks, each about 25 centimetres long, and a knife wound on her back, and about a dozen bruises to her legs.
A couple of days later, the woman went to the same friend with a lump and bruise on her cheek. She said her partner "lost his temper again" and hit her.
The next day she went to her doctor, who noticed she appeared tired, distressed and teary, to seek treatment for an infection.
After he noticed her fresh black eye and a bleeding cut to her face, she told him of the abuse and showed him three stab wounds and bruising on her legs and back.
She told him her partner got angry when she refused sex and held her down on the heater, burning her buttock, before he hit and stabbed her.
The doctor reported the man after the woman said she refused to go to police and left.
Officers arrested the man at Narrabundah in September.
He was remanded in custody when he appeared in front of Special Magistrate Ken Cush. He will be sentenced in March.
