Firefighter is scarred for life in attack

A FIREFIGHTER was scarred for life after he was repeatedly struck in the face by a thug wearing a metal knuckleduster.

Gary Mullen needed 17 stitches in deep cuts on his face and nose after the attack. He was assaulted when he answered the door of his Livingston home to Allan Wilson at 8am.

Mr Mullen has been left with five scars of up to two inches on his, nose, cheek and forehead.

Wilson 32, an HGV mechanic from Livingston, was jailed for two years and five months after pleading guilty to the unprovoked attack at Livingston Sheriff Court yesterday.

John Barclay, prosecuting, told the court Wilson and his victim had been drinking at a mutual friend's house until 2.30am on the day of the attack. Mr Mullen was wakened at 5am by Wilson at his front door.

He refused to answer the door to let him in and went back to bed, but Wilson "rather bizarrely" returned at 8am and again demanded entry.

When Mr Mullen opened the door, Wilson stepped into his hallway and punched him on the face "a number of times" while wearing a knuckleduster.

Mr Barclay said: "The accused began to shout at Mr Mullen about paint on his front door then left, leaving Mr Mullen bleeding heavily from the face."

Stewart Peebles, defending, said Wilson had told police that he was very drunk after consuming ten cans of beer and "two or three" Valium tablets.

He believed, wrongly, that Mr Mullen was responsible for splashing white paint on his front door. "He was genuinely remorseful and contrite about what he had done," Mr Peebles said.

Sheriff Douglas Kinloch told Wilson: "This wasn't an assault carried out on the spur of the moment, but a planned assault carried out after you armed yourself with a vicious weapon."