Swellings Had Attacked Before

3:26pm Wednesday 16th January 2008

DURING legal arguments at the trial the judge, Andrew Smith, heard evidence of bad character.

Some of it was allowed as evidence in the trial-the three attacks earlier in the night, and the one a week previously.

However, an attack on a Mr Collinson on August 1 was deemed inadmissible and not put to the jury.

At around 8pm that night Mr Collinson heard a smashing sound coming from the front of his house.

When he went to the door he saw four males, who his daughter knew.

She identified one of them to him as "Swellhead"-Adam Swellings.

The gang were drinking and Mr Collinson told them not to.

"Swellings said I'm 18 mate' when I told them to stop drinking," said Mr Collinson in a police statement.

"As he said this he approached me. I didn't think anything of it and turned around at which point I saw him throw a punch which connected with my lip.

"I then felt a sharp punch to the back of my head, and I heard my daughter screaming," he said.

Michael Chambers QC, prosecuting, said: "This shows a propensity to assault residents who come out of their houses in response to damage."

He called the defendants "a marauding gang intent on aggression and violence".

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