Unprovoked attacks mar weekend across Scotland

FIVE men needed hospital treatment after a spate of assaults during the Bank Holiday weekend, it emerged yesterday.

Two of the attacks, which happened 60 miles apart, were said to be unprovoked.

In the first attack, a 20-year-old man was knocked unconsciousness outside the Picture House in Lothian Road, Edinburgh, between 2:30am and 3am on Friday. He was with friends when an unknown man attacked him. He was treated in hospital for a broken jaw.

A spokesman for Lothian and Borders Police said it appeared to be a random assault and urged witnesses to the incident to come forward.

The suspect is Asian, in his early twenties, 5ft 9in, of medium build and had short dark spiky hair.

Witnesses are also being sought to two separate attacks on two men who were found with serious injuries in Livingston, West Lothian.

Both assaults are thought to have happened at about 2:15am on Saturday.

Elsewhere, a 25-year-old man was set upon in an unprovoked attack by three men in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, as he made his way home from a night out in Glasgow.

He was treated for a head injury at Paisley's Royal Alexandra Hospital, following the attack in Shanks Park shortly after 2am yesterday.

Police in Aberdeen are also investigating an assault on a man in a bar on Sunday morning.