SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - A 49-year-old man couldn't remember how many times he punched a woman in the face July 20, 2008, but he disputed it was as many times as the prosecutor claimed.

"Knowing what I can physically do, she wouldn't be awake,' Conrad Joseph Minute told territorial court on Jan. 6, meaning that if he had punched her up to 10 times, as the Crown argued, she would have been knocked unconscious.

Regardless, Judge Bernadette Schmaltz, visibly unimpressed with Minute's explanation, sentenced him to six months in jail minus two months and 11 days credit for time already served.

Schmaltz said the offender was on track for a "life sentence on the instalment plan" given his criminal record, which includes a 30-day sentence in Alberta last October for resisting arrest and possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose, a two-and-a-half year prison term for sexual assault in Fort Smith, and six months in jail in 1991 for assault causing bodily harm and uttering threats in Hay River.

"You got to get something under control. Otherwise, your record will get longer and longer," said Schmaltz.

Minute pleaded guilty to assault causing bodily harm on Dec. 9, relating to the 2008 incident.

Crown prosecutor Marc Lecorre told the court that on July 20, 2008, Minute, formerly of Hay River, became intoxicated at a gathering in Yellowknife.

Later, at a residence, Minute started calling the victim derogatory names and then became physically violent. He shoved her into a computer desk, and then grabbed her and pushed her to the floor. He climbed on top of her, choked her and punched her in the face "five to 10 times," explained Lecorre.

Moments after the beating, as Minute was still on top of her, the woman told him to "just kill her." Instead, Minute got up and fled the residence on his bicycle. Her nine-year-old son could hear the attack from his bedroom, said Lecorre, who requested a "stiff" jail sentence of six to eight months.

The Crown submitted five photos taken after the attack as evidence. They showed the victim with a large red bruise on the right side of her face, a swollen lip and red bruises on her arms and neck.

Defence lawyer Tracy Bock asked that his client serve a six month jail term minus credit for time served.

Minute, born and raised in Fort Smith, has been a chronic alcoholic for 20 years, but sober for the past two years, according to Bock.

He's "doing better now," said Bock.

Minute also received two years probation, a $50 fine, a five-year firearms prohibition and was ordered to submit a DNA sample to police in case he already hadn't done so as a result of this previous criminal record.

He was also ordered to have no contact with the victim.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.