Thug punched pub doorman on first weekend after lockdown

A DRINKER attacked a doorman in front of his mates as he was being escorted from a pub on the first weekend after venues opened following lockdown, a court heard.

Oliver Hudson, 24, began causing trouble in the White Lion, in Melton, on the night of Saturday, May 21 last year.

Nicola Patten, prosecuting, told Leicester Crown Court: “It was the first weekend that pubs were allowed to open after the Covid restrictions. The defendant tried to sit at a table where six people were already seated, when the rule of six was in place.

“He sat with a couple who did not know him and refused a polite request to leave their table.”

He then told a doorman “make me leave”.

The prosecutor said: “The doorman was using open-handed gestures, trying to persuade him to move and was escorting him out of the bar and into the garden.”

However, friends of the defendant then began making comments and the doorman shoved Hudson into the beer garden. He turned to assist a colleague with an argumentative woman when Hudson punched him on the side of his face.

Hudson then threw another punch, but missed and the two men ended up struggling on the floor.

The doorman suffered a fractured and dislocated finger during the altercation.

In interview, following arrest, Hudson said he had consumed “a lot of alcohol” and had himself ended up with a bruised and bloodshot right eye.

In a personal impact statement, the doorman said the attack was a contributory factor in his decision to give up his door staff job, because the risk of being badly hurt when he had a family to consider meant “it’s not worth it”.

Miss Patten said the doorman’s fractured finger was permanently displaced and he had undergone physiotherapy.

Hudson, formerly of Dulverton Road, Melton, admitted causing actual bodily harm.

Fergus Malone, mitigating, said references spoke well of Hudson as a polite, respectable and hardworking young man, who had no previous convictions.

He said: “He’s now moved from Melton and resides with his father in Grantham.”

Recorder Adrian Reynolds said: “Your previous good character saves you from immediate prison today. You were obviously drunk and maybe it involved some postlockdown excess.

“The doorman was just trying to do his job, an unenviable job, having to deal with people who get drunk and behave unreasonably.

“Your employer confirms you’re a hard worker and I accept this incident was out of character and you’ve never done anything like this before or since. I will give you a chance.”

Hudson was given a six-month jail sentence, suspended for two years, with 100 hours of unpaid work.

He was ordered to pay his victim £1,000 in compensation as well as £425 court costs.