A JILTED lover who beat his former girlfriend about the head with an iron bar, leaving her blind and brain damaged, was jailed for 14 years yesterday.

Suzanne Roberts was attacked so savagely that she has been left disabled and suffering from a rare condition which means that although she is blind she believes she can still see.

Her injuries were the worst a police surgeon had ever seen on a living victim.

Security guard Graham Hadden, 41, of Brook Street, Gloucester, showed now emotion as he was sentenced at Preston Crown Court yesterday after being convicted of attempted murder at an earlier hearing in Mold Crown Court.

Trial Judge, Mr Justice Gage, said Miss Roberts' life had been destroyed.

"Her life has quite literally been devastated. I take into account that you, as a former lover, felt jilted by her when you discovered her having sex with another man when you were staying in her flat.

"But this was not a sudden flash of anger.

"Your attack took place a week later."

Hadden, a security guard, travelled from his Gloucester home and beat Miss Roberts, 37, about the head with an iron bar.

The jury was told that the defendant had had a brief relationship with Miss Roberts, which ended prior to the murder bid on January 2, 2001, at a first floor flat in High Street, Connah's Quay.

After he attacked Miss Roberts with an iron bar she was saved only by the intervention of a pizza delivery man who called for his money. The defendant then raised the alarm, trying to claim that he had found her injured and said she must have been attacked by someone else.

He claimed she had been attacked by an intruder and in turning up when he did, had saved her life.

A piece of Miss Roberts' skull was found on the heavily blood stained carpet.

Hadden had two previous convictions for violence.

Defence counsel, Patrick Harrington said Hadden did have "the honest feeling he may have been wronged".

Mr Harrington conceded this was no excuse for the horrendous beating.

Miss Roberts sat in the public gallery to hear the sentencing but she and the family did not wish to speak later.

Mr Gage recommended that Hadden serve at least half the sentence before parole is considered.

"The probability is what caused you to carry out the attack is that you, an ex-lover, felt jilted by her in a hurtful way when you discovered her having sex with another man at a time you were staying at the flat.

"A substantial prison term is inevitable."

In a statement last year the family said: "It is only through the support of many people that she got through what has been a traumatic time.

"Our grateful thanks go to the emergency services who saved her life and to the thoughtful way the police have helped her through this time."