“Evil” Terry Stoute has been jailed for five years after he caused his girlfriend life-changing injuries in a crash he caused by pulling on the car’s handbrake.

The 36-year-old sent the Audi A3 that his girlfriend Lisa Dancer was driving spinning off the road and crashing into a ditch.

Tanning salon worker Miss Dancer is now registered disabled from the injuries she suffered, including a punctured lung, a broken rib and a serious back injury in the crash on the A40 between the Cutteslowe roundabout and Marston, Oxfordshire.

Miss Dancer’s Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Chesta, was killed when the car went off the road on May 10, 2013.

Stoute was jailed by a judge sitting at Oxford Crown Court last Thursday following his conviction by a jury after he denied inflicting grievous bodily harm and causing a danger to other road users.

Judge Peter Ross also imposed a seven-year restraining order, banning him from contact with his 36-year-old former girlfriend.

He said: “You engaged in domestic violence towards her, putting your hands around her neck and punching her in the face, as well as mocking and belittling her.

“I find that on this occasion you did have an intention to cause her harm —this offence has to be taken in the context of what has gone before it.

“She has suffered permanent, life-changing injuries because of your actions. You are a violent man with previous convictions for violence, including for causing grievous bodily harm.

“You put a number of other people at risk. Your actions could have led to their deaths or caused them serious injuries.”

Stoute, of Cresswell Close, Whitley Wood, Reading, will also have to pay a £120 victim surcharge.

Miss Dancer, of Kidlington, Oxon, said she had been let down by Thames Valley Police and the Crown Prosecution Service, after the case took 20 months to come to court —described by Judge Ross as a “catastrophic failure”.

She said: “I’m glad he’s been jailed, but I have got to suffer for the rest of my life. I’m registered disabled, I live in pain every day and I have lost my dog. To some people that might seem like nothing, but he was a part of my family for five-and-a-half years.”

Commenting on Stoute’s conviction, she said: “He’s just evil. I’m just so glad he has been found guilty and put away because he’s capable of killing someone. I’m not surprised that some women don’t come forward. It has been a real nightmare, and now I want to work with women who have suffered domestic violence.

“I have such supportive friends and family, I just feel for those women who haven’t and still have to go through this.”

A spokesman for Thames Valley Police said: “Our Professional Standards Department has not received a complaint from the member of the public regarding this matter.”

A CPS spokesman said they could not comment before the case file was reviewed.