A TESCO security officer allegedly lost his temper, launched a gratuitous revenge attack on a drunken customer and smashed his skull, away from CCTV cameras, and when his bosses weren’t watching, a jury heard.

Burnley Crown Court was told how ‘well built, strong and powerful’ Matloob Akhtar, 37, allegedly punched Stephen Aldren and knocked him out cold, as the victim was leaving the large Accrington store.

Mr Aldren, said to have been misbehaving and ‘falling down drunk’ with a friend in the shop, landed very heavily to the back of his head.

He remembered nothing about the incident apart from waking up in hospital.

Akhtar told police it was a pre-emptive strike in anticipated self defence, but the prosecution allege that he ‘decided to teach Mr Aldren a lesson, a lesson he was not going to forgot.’ Prosecutor Timothy Brennand told the hearing: “The pros-ecution suggest that what the defendant did was gratuitous, unnecessary and was borne out of a motive to exact revenge because of the way the victim was behaving.”

Akhtar, of Avenue Parade, Accrington, denies inflicting grie-vous bodily harm, on November 10, 2012.

Mr Brennand told the court that Mr Aldren and a man named Stephen Connor had gone to buy crisps and alcohol and the pair were drunk. They had been in the store for some time and came to the attention of the manager, a staff member and security – the defendant.

The two men were intercepted, taken hold of and the decision was taken to eject them from the premises.

It seemed that Mr Aldren was the more vociferous and vocal of the ‘two drunks’ as they were escorted from the store. He wouldn’t leave.

Mr Brennand said: “What the defendant contends was that from beginning to end he was acting defensively. The prosecution contends that there came a moment when that defensive stand turned to offensive.”

The prosecutor said Mr Aldren was abusive to the defendant and Akhtar lost his temper.

He said the Crown suggested that it was no coincidence that what happened was well away from the ‘all seeing eye of the CCTV’.

Proceeding