Thug is jailed after attack
Young mum suffers horror injuries
A sheriff this week told a thug who burst into a young mother’s home as part of a gang of five and gave her “an absolute hiding” that in days past he could have been hanged for the crime.
Jamie Wallace, 34, was acting as part of a group that beat Leesa-Marie Myles with a Buckfast bottle, threatened her with a hammer, and punched and kicked her so badly she was left with broken teeth and 14 separate injuries. He was jailed for two and a half years on Monday.
Stirling Sheriff Court heard that Miss Myles, 27, was “giving sanctuary” to Wallace’s partner, Nicola Jane Barr, 33, when Wallace’s customised VW Polo screeched to a halt outside her first floor flat on Doune’s Main Street at around midnight on August 1 last year.
Men shouted “this house” and “here” before barging in and subjecting Miss Myles to a “shocking” assault.
She told a jury: “Jamie punched me. I tried to grab his hand, but got hit by one of the other ones.
“Another boy reached over and hit me on the head with a Buckfast bottle, and I fell into the floor in the foetal position. Jamie stamped on the left hand side of my head. He had Timberland desert boots on.”
When she tried to get up, Wallace came at her with a claw hammer. She grabbed it with both hands “for dear life” and Wallace kicked her in the mouth.
Miss Myles, who works as a plasterer, said: “My teeth got smashed, I got dizzy, but I wasn’t going to let go of that hammer.”
On her hands and knees, she received further kicks to the body, until an older man in the gang said “that’s enough” and her attackers left. Each one, apart from the older man, gave her a final kick on the way out.
Miss Myles was left with multiple bruises, two cracked teeth, marks on her fingers from holding onto the hammer, and had to receive dental treatment. She said she no longer felt safe living on her own, and has had returned to stay with her parents.
Another female friend of Miss Myles was dragged out of a back bedroom – where she had earlier been ironing – and also “given a tanking”, the court heard.
After a five day trial, a jury took less than an hour to find Wallace, of North Lea, Doune, guilty, by majority, of acting with others and assaulting Miss Myles to her injury. He had denied the charge, but did not give evidence.
Sheriff Wyllie Robertson told him: “This was serious offence involving invading the complainer’s home and seriously assaulting her. It’s extremely fortunate that the level of violence did not result in more serious injury.
“You can be described as a violent man. You were convicted of assault by stabbing when you were very young. The gravity of this is such that no sentence other than custody is appropriate.
“In historical times this offence was what was called a capital offence, which meant you would have faced the death penalty. That’s the gravity of invading somebody’s house. While we don’t have, in these enlightened times, the death penalty, the gravity of this offence is marked by its historical origins.
“There is no useful purpose in calling for [background] reports. You’ll go to prison for two years six months.”
Turning to dock guards, he added: “Take him away.”
The court heard Wallace had an “extensive” record, with previous convictions running to six pages.