Drunk table leg attacker jailed

A DRUNK who savagely beat a friend around the head with a wooden table leg after consuming a "skinful" has been jailed for 12 months.

Bury St Edmunds Crown Court heard that Ipswich man Dean Piper, 31, had beaten his friend in an unprovoked attack after the pair had been drinking during the afternoon.

Piper's victim was left needing hospital treatment, where he received stitches to seal a gash to his head.

The court was told that Piper, who has previous convictions for violence and public order offences, was a heavy drinker who had been abusing alcohol for around 10 years.

He appeared at court on Friday for sentencing after previously pleading guilty to a charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

Peter Gair, prosecuting, said the attack took place at Piper's Station Street flat after the defendant and his victim men had shared a two-litre bottle of cider.

"The defendant left the room and returned with what turned out to be a two-foot long wooden table leg. He started hitting the victim about the body, shoulders and head," he said. "The victim was losing blood from a laceration to his head, which required stitches in hospital.

"The defendant, who called the ambulance, claimed to the operator that somebody else had attacked his friend."

Mitigating, John Akast told the court there was no explanation for the unprovoked attack.

"My client has been a drunk for at least the last 10 years, and on that day both men had each had a skinful," he said. "What happened here, it would seem, was one of those inexplicable flair-ups which occurs between drinkers without a cause.

"Why it happened, nobody knows, but it was one of the consequences of heavy drinking."

Jailing Piper for 12 months, Judge John Sennitt said: "I have come to the conclusion, having regard to the nature of the offence and bearing in mind your antecedence in relation to this type of offending, that matters are now so serious I cannot impose a non-custodial sentence."