Pair jailed for knife assault on stranger

Santos’ case he had admitted attempting to murder Mr Millar during the attack on June 3 last year.

The judge said: “This was a brutal and excessively violent act perpetrated with weapons on an unarmed man.”

During the assault the victim suffered eight stabbing or slashing wounds to his chest, stomach, left flank and head.

Lord Armstrong said: “Several of the wounds he sustained were in close proximity to vital organs, including his heart, his spleen, lungs and kidneys. These wounds were life threatening.”

“In addition in the course of the attack by you your victim sustained a wound to his left eye which, despite repeated attempts at treatment, has resulted in a total loss of vision in that eye,” he added.

Lord Armstrong said: “It is pertinent to note that these injuries would not have been sustained by your victim if you each had not been carrying a knife in the early hours of that Sunday morning.”

The judge said he noted that the attack was “a spontaneous event which was short lived”.

He said that in Dos Santos’ case he took into account that he has expressed remorse for his role in the assault.

The court heard that Dos Santos has an 18-month prison sentence awaiting to be served in his native Portugal when he is deported.

Lord Armstrong said that he took into account that first offender Correia was previously attacked in the centre of Perth and seriously injured and was carrying a knife for self protection but added he did not regard that as mitigation.

The court earlier heard that the two Portuguese nationals, who have been in prison since June, had left a flat in Perth intending to go and surf the internet at commercial premises in the centre of the city with a third man.

Mr Millar had gone for a meal with work colleagues before visiting bars. While out on the street he was asked by one of the three for a cigarette and replied he did not smoke but then got into an altercation with Correia before he and Dos Santos launched the knife attack.

The assault was estimated to have lasted about four seconds and was captured on CCTV before the attackers fled.

Defence counsel Drew McKenzie, for Dos Santos, said the former kitchen porter was “genuinely remorseful” and recognised a lengthy custodial sentence was inevitable.

Tony Lenehan, for Correia, said he was a hard-working man of humble origins and previous good character who would be deported at the end of his time in custody.