Woman strangled and punched ‘hard’ in city gang attack

Dad sentenced for his part in violent assault

A father-of-five throttled and punched a woman in an unprovoked gang attack in Canterbury city centre.

Michelle Winterbourne was helping a drunk friend in the high street when she was approached by Daniel Kiefer and others.

At first Kiefer, 36, offered to help Miss Winterbourne outside the Metro bank, but he soon started levelling unfounded, perverse allegations at her.

“As she pulled out her phone to call an ambulance [for her friend] Kiefer said ‘put your phone away or I will knock you out,’” Steven Attridge, prosecuting at Canterbury Crown Court, said.

Kiefer then goaded another person to attack Miss Winterbourne, claiming to have blocked the view of CCTV.

And as she struggled with another, Kiefer grabbed her throat during the attack in May last year.

“This defendant punches Miss Winterbourne in the side of the face with significant force,” Mr Attridge went on.

Others then subjected Miss Winterbourne to “further humiliation,” the court heard.

The prosecutor dubbed the attack a “prolonged assault with strangulation and suffocation”.

After his arrest, Kiefer claimed he acted in self-defence.

When he was arrested for an unrelated matter in New Town Street, Canterbury, in September, he would turn his violence towards police.

After assaulting three officers he claimed “he has a split personality and he turned into ‘Keefer’, who he has no control over,” Mr Attridge continued.

Kiefer, who has 13 convictions for 27 offences, pleaded guilty to occasioning actual bodily harm against Miss Winterbourne and three counts of assaulting emergency workers.

Phil Rowley, mitigating, said Kiefer’s life and childhood had been “blighted by drugs and alcohol”.

Kiefer began abusing drink aged 13 and suffered a series of mental health difficulties.

Since being held on remand in HMP Elmley, Kiefer’s physical health has been in a state of decline, the court heard.

Judge Rupert Lowe told him: “You grabbed her by the neck and pushed her against the wall and, later on, punched her hard in the face.”

On Thursday, Kiefer, of Shooters Hill, Dover, was jailed for nine months for the assault against Miss Winterbourne to run concurrently to three months for assaulting emergency workers.