A FRODSHAM man accused of starting a fight that led to another man being shot and paralysed has walked free from court.

Alan George Edwards, 35, of St Hilda's Drive, denied violent disorder and affray and was acquitted after Judge Merfyn Hughes said prosecution evidence was too unreliable.

Mr Edwards was arrested in March in connection with the fight outside the Tanners pub in Castlefields, Runcorn.

The prosecution alleged that Mr Edwards assaulted Paul Crook after Jane Crook, his wife, shouted at him and a friend for urinating against a nearby wall.

The court heard that the day before the shooting, which happened just after midnight on February 12, 2004, the Crooks had attended a friend's funeral before starting drinking at around 4.30pm.

A group of 'strangers' were seen drinking in the Tanners pub later on but Mr Edwards told police he had left at 10pm, although the court heard he did not tell them where he was or who he was with at the time of the shooting.

Mr Crook, from Castlefields, Runcorn, described 'the most frightening experience in my life' to the court.

The father-of-two is unlikely to ever walk again after being shot in the back.

The 44-year-old said: "I heard a bang and felt excruciating pain in my back. I was in agony and I couldn't feel my legs at all. It was like they were blocks of concrete.

"I thought I was about to die."

Mrs Crook picked out Mr Edwards in an identity parade as the man who punched her husband to the floor.

But in two earlier parades, she had wrongly identified two volunteers as the two other suspects in the incident.

Summing up, Judge Hughes said: "Genuine witnesses can make genuine mistakes in identifying someone they think was the offender.

"There is insufficient reliable evidence to go to the jury."