Court Bearpit knife attacker jailed for life
AMAN who slashed people with a knife and bottles in Bristol city centre has been jailed for life.
Anwar Maio carried out four drunken, unprovoked attacks between August and December last year.
Bristol Crown Court heard he used a knife to slash one woman’s face in the Bearpit, and cut three men with bottles.
The 32-year-old, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to four charges of wounding with intent and a single charge of possessing a blade.
Judge James Patrick told him: “You are an intelligent and articulate man whose life has been blighted by statelessness, homelessness and alcohol addiction.”
The judge told Maio he would have to serve six years in prison before being eligible for parole.
Hannah Squire, prosecuting, said Maio was in the Bearpit when he accused a man of taking his bicycle in August last year.
In the course of a struggle which ensued, Maio used a knife to slash Franceine Bone on her left cheek, causing nerve damage and a lifechanging injury.
Maio struck again in October, when he attacked Christopher Howard with a bottle outside a shop in Stokes Croft.
The court heard Maio was arrested and released pending further police inquiries, before being recalled to prison to serve two weeks of a previously suspended sentence for common assault.
Having been released on November 9, he struck again in December, attacking Nicholas Hinder and Edwin Hensley with bottles in the city centre.
Robert Morgan-Jones, defending, said Maio was born in Somalia and smuggled to Canada when he was a toddler.
When he was 16, he travelled to the UK with his cousin’s passport but his claim for asylum failed and he was deported back to Canada.
After lapsing into crime and receiving jail time at the age of 21 he was deported to Somalia on a flight via Holland, where he claimed asylum and lived as a refugee until 2018.
He then illegally entered the UK and lived with his cousin in Fishponds before his relation was sectioned under the Mental Health Act and he became homeless, living in a tent in Bristol.
Mr Morgan-Jones said: “He did magic tricks.
“He got alcohol to keep his level topped up. He drank one litre of gin a day and beer on top.
“He would wake up at 10am or 11am by traffic and he would get beer to take the sting out of his hangover.
“He could not cope with the position he found himself in.
“He is stateless, he is homeless, he had been successfully deported from Canada, alcohol was his escape and he drank more and more and more to blot out his life.”
Mr Morgan-Jones said Maio was regularly robbed and pushed around himself and he “lived by the rules of the street”.
He told the court: “He is deeply ashamed of what he’s done.
“It was all in the context of very, very heavy intoxication.”