A former Tasmanian government MP is alleged to have punched her partner in the face and verbally abused him multiple times over a decade, according to court documents.
Key points:
- Kathryn Hay is alleged to have assaulted her partner, Troy Shane Richardson, by pushing him, punching him in the face and upper body, and throwing a bowl of cereal at him
- Ms Hay is alleged to have accused him of tampering with her car and putting cameras in the house
- Ms Hay was a Labor member for Bass in northern Tasmania and was also a Miss Tasmania and Miss Australia
Kathryn Isobel Hay was a Labor member for Bass in northern Tasmania between 2002 and 2006, and was also Miss Tasmania and Miss Australia 1999.
She made a first appearance in the Launceston Magistrates Court last Thursday on one count of emotional abuse and intimidation.
Ms Hay did not enter a plea.
The charge relates to allegations between October 22, 2011 and February 13, 2022.
Documents filed with the court by the prosecution allege Ms Hay assaulted her partner, Troy Shane Richardson, by pushing him, punching him in the face and upper body, and throwing a bowl of cereal at him.
The prosecution alleges she would call Mr Richardson a “c***”, “lazy”, “hateful”, “a piece of s***”, “inferior”, “pathetic” and “dumb”.
It is alleged Ms Hay told her partner he should kill himself, because “the world would be better off without him”, accused him of cheating and made throat-slitting gestures at him.
The documents also show Ms Hay is alleged to have told people she wanted Mr Richardson to suicide “so she’d get everything”.
She is alleged to have accused him of tampering with her car and putting cameras in the house.
The 47-year-old is also accused of preventing Mr Richardson from seeing his parents, and of drafting correspondence to the Director of Public Prosecutions on his behalf without his consent.
Ms Hay is further alleged to have discouraged Mr Richardson from attending counselling appointments.
The 46 particulars listed, the prosecution alleged in the document, amounted to “a course of conduct that you knew, or should have known, was likely to have the effect of unreasonably controlling and intimidating and would cause mental harm, apprehension and fear” to Mr Richardson.
Ms Hay was the first woman of Aboriginal descent to be elected to the state’s lower house.
She did not recontest her seat in the 2006 election, but later had an unsuccessful tilt at the Legislative Council seat of Windermere in 2009.
Ms Hay will next appear in court in May.
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