Salon attacker loses bid to get prison term cut

A DRUNKEN thug who left a Lindley hairdresser with “life-changing” injuries after attacking him in his own salon deserved his tough 13-year jail term, the Appeal Court has decided.

Aaron Holroyd, 25, was locked up at Leeds Crown Court last September after jurors convicted him of inflicting grievous bodily on Marcus SewellFletcher.

His accomplice, Joshua Gibbon, 25, got the same sentence after he was found guilty of an identical offence.

Mr Sewell-Fletcher was discovered on the floor of his salon in February 2017.

Covered in soot, he was“struggling to breathe” and his horrific injuries included 19 rib fractures and a broken eye socket.

He had been out drinking with Gibbon and Holroyd the previous night, before the three men ended up at the 51-year-old’s salon in Acre Street.

The trio were seen chatting amicably in the street, but things later turned violent, with Mr SewellFletcher suffering a “savage attack.”

Holroyd and Gibbon were sentenced on the basis that “they acted together using their shod feet.”

Mr Sewell-Fletcher’s injuries were “extensive and life-changing”, Mr Justice Haddon-Cave told London’s Appeal Court.

The violence he endured “knew no bounds” and his victim impact statement made for “powerful and poignant reading,” the judge added.

Holroyd, of Briarlyn Road, Birchencliffe, challenged his jail term, claiming it was far too harsh.

Mr Justice Haddon-Cave noted Holroyd’s previous blameless life and said the attack on the hairdresser was “totally out of character.”

“Perhaps one lesson that may be learned from this concerns the perils of drink and the violence to which it can lead,” he added.

“This was a severe sentence, but we are not minded to interfere with it,” the judge concluded, dismissing Holroyd’s appeal.