‘PEACEMAKER’ LEFT WITH A BLEED ON BRAIN AFTER THUG ATTACK
Victim had been trying to calm down a mass brawl on city centre street
A DRUNKEN thug broke a man’s jaw after mistakenly believing he had assaulted him when mass disorder erupted in Hanley.
Lyndon Kendall was hit when a man swung his belt around as trouble flared in Trinity Street in the early hours of the morning.
But instead of punching his attacker, Kendall struck a man who was trying to keep the peace.
Stoke-on-trent Crown Court heard the victim fell to the floor and was taken to hospital, where he needed treatment for a broken jaw and a bleed on the brain.
Now 30-year-old Kendall has been jailed for 18 months.
Prosecutor Timothy Ashmole said a disturbance broke out after 2am on June 8, 2019, and men were swinging belts.
Mr Ashmole said: “One caught the defendant in the face. The complainant and his friends were not linked to the belt swingers and he was trying to be a peacemaker.
“Kendall punched him to the floor and he went to hospital with head trauma.”
Kendall was arrested and was verbally abusive to officers.
Mr Ashmole said: “The defendant threatened to rip his jaw off and knock him out.”
In custody, he bit the officer and was found in possession of cannabis.
Kendall, of Garden Street, Burslem, pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding, assaulting an emergency worker and possession of cannabis.
Jason Holt, mitigating, said: “He accepts the offence on the basis it was a single blow. He mistakenly believed that was the person who attacked him.
“Drink played its part. He acknowledges and accepts when in drink he brings problems for himself and others.
“He has stopped drinking and using cannabis. These matters go back to June 2019. There have been no problems since that date.”
Judge Paul Glenn said: “The victim had come to Stoke-ontrent for a night out with friends. There is no evidence he had misbehaved in any way.
“He was simply someone who had the misfortune to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“There had been an altercation in the street.
“One of the men swung a belt around and it caught you in the face.
“You took the victim as being one of the group and you attacked him. In fact, he was trying to calm things down.
“At the police station you bit the officer’s hand.
“There is a pattern of violent behaviour which indicates a propensity for violence.”