Killer threw pan of boiling water over other murderer
INMATE SCARRED FOR LIFE AFTER ATTACK IN JAIL
AN inmate has been scarred for life after having a pan of boiling water thrown over him by a fellow life-prisoner in a Leicestershire jail, a court heard.
The victim suffered horrific burns to his face and upper body – and said seeing his disfigured features in the mirror is a constant reminder of the assault by Dani Watson.
Watson, 32, had been due to go on trial at Leicester Crown Court, having denied the offence of inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent.
However, the trial was halted after he entered a guilty plea to an alternative charge of causing grievous bodily harm, without intent, arguing he had acted in “excessive selfdefence”.
The incident happened at HMP Gartree, near Market Harborough, on June 5, 2019, where both men were serving life sentences for murder, prosecutor Stephen Donnelly told the jury.
Mr Donnelly said the attack happened when Watson and his victim were in a kitchen together.
The victim felt “intense pain” and
taken to hospital with burns to his face, neck, chest and hands. He had skin grafts and still has nightmares about the ordeal, Mr Donnelly said.
Photographs of the injuries were shown in court. Mr Donnelly said: “He will always have scar tissue marking the burns.”
The barrister claimed that prior to the attack, Watson instructed the victim to target two other inmates with a slingshot weapon.
The victim did not want to do so
instead used the weapon to fire a missile through a toughened glass panel, hoping this act of vandalism would get him placed into the safety of solitary confinement. This did not happen.
Instead, Mr Donnelly said, the man returned the weapon to Watson, who was so angry he allegedly punched him in the face – although the defence denied this particular assault.
The boiling water incident which followed was allegedly “punishwas ment” for not carrying out Watson’s instructions, Mr Donnelly said. However, defence barrister, Lee Marklew, said Watson feared the other man and, having heard he had a potentially lethal weapon, had acted in “excessive self-defence”.
The victim, who in his 30s, is also subject to a life sentence for murder, involving a stabbing.
Mr Marklew said that while at HMP Gartree, Watson had an “exemplary record” and was described in a prison officer’s reference as “respectand ful, polite, calm and mature”. He was a cleaner and was also trusted to be a kitchen worker. By contrast, the victim had a “bad disciplinary record,” Mr Marklew told the court.
He said: “Mr Watson’s hot-headedness was out of character during the time he had spent in prison.
“He was confronted by a man with a weapon that he knew had caused criminal damage to the window,” Mr Marklew said.
Watson, who still has more than 12 years to serve of his life term, was given a further 12 months in custody.
This will be served consecutive to the existing sentence.
Judge Timothy Spencer told him: “There’s a chasm between you and the prosecution as to what was really going on.
“You accept you overreacted and poured over him a pan of boiling liquid that caused shocking injuries.
“He is now scarred and, from his victim statement, he says he can’t look at himself in the mirror without being close to, or producing, tears.
“You’ve scarred this man for life and it can’t be ignored.
“He constantly lives in fear and his ability to escape trouble is hampered by the fact he’s in prison.”
AMONG the excitement of Boris Johnson’s roadmap announcement was a sentence that should have been heard louder in Leicester than anywhere else.
“We can’t rule out reintroducing restrictions at a local level,” the Prime Minister warned.
Rates in the city remain stubbornly high and have risen in some areas of the county over the past week.
While the countdown begins to June 21 and the other key dates, it is worth remembering Leicester and parts of Leicestershire have been here before.
No-one here wants to experience local lockdown deja vu, least of all city mayor Sir Peter Soulsby.
“We don’t want to have to go through that again, we don’t want Leicester to be singled out in the way it was last summer and has been since,” he said.
The late-night report about why
Leicester should be the first city to be placed in local lockdown and the battle to get test and trace data to try to limit the spread of the virus locally are fresh in Sir Peter’s mind. But this time he says there is one big difference.
“There is a solution this time, there is a way out. The vaccine is the way to end all of this, everyone is agreed on that, yet there are still strict rules governing when people can have it.
“I understand the need to prioritise certain groups but I’m told places like the Peepul Centre are not booked out, they are not being used to their potential, and in a city where rates among the working-age population remain high, I
see no reason why if there is the supply and capacity within the system, we can’t work through people and vaccinate them quicker than the timetable says.
“In a city where so many people are in work, and where we have people living so close together in some communities, it is the one thing that will drive those figures down.
“But the opportunity to drive those figures down is being missed because of the inflexible nature of the vaccine programme at a national level.”
There are some groups in particular Sir Peter would like to see the vaccine offered to.
“Teachers, school staff, bus drivers, supermarket workers – anyone whose job involves face-to-face contact with members of the public. No amount of screening or masks can protect those people who come into contact with others every day who inevitably, and often unknowingly, have the virus. “Offering the vaccine to these people would make a real difference.” Priority lists were drawn up by the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisations, NHS England administers the rollout and the Department of Health and Social Care makes decisions based on priority groups.
The Mercury has contacted all of the above bodies and asked for a response to Sir Peter’s comments.
More than 250,000 first jabs have been given across the city and counties since December.