Mum of three gets jail for glass attack on pub’s landlord

A MUM-OF-THREE broke down in tears as she was jailed for nine months for glassing a pub landlord.

John Higginson suffered a two-centimetre gash to his forehead when 39-year-old Tracy Manning hurled a beer glass in his face at The Upper George in Crown Street, Halifax.

Bradford Crown Court heard that the landlord had asked her to leave the pub after she and her friends drunkenly chanted support for the BNP and EDL.

Manning was being escorted off the premises by Mr Higginson when she grabbed the glass and threw it at him.

Prosecutor Bashir Ahmed said the landlord followed Manning outside and as he tried to detain her she punched him and poked her thumb into his left eye.

When police arrived at the pub, Manning, of Grisedale Close, Pellon, said: “Yeah, I did it. I’m sorry.”

The court heard Mr Higginson was left with a scar and has suffered sleeplessness and anxiety since the incident in April.

Manning, who has previous convictions for assault, battery and resisting the police, admitted assault occasioning actual bodily harm,

Her barrister, Paul Fleming, said the offence had been a thoughtless, irresponsible, knee-jerk reaction in drink.

She had stopped drinking in the last four months, he said.

Judge Jonathan Rose said it was an extremely serious offence and told Manning she had been involved in violence too many times.

“You caused serious injury to this man,” he told her.

“He was in no way the author of his own misfortune. This was your fault and your fault alone.”

As well as jailing her, Judge Rose also banned Manning from entering the pub for the next two years.

He said licensees needed to know the courts would protect them when they were victims of violence.

Halifax Courier