9:05am Tuesday 9th March 2010
By Sam Chadderton
A TEENAGE soldier has been jailed for headbutting an ‘innocent bystander’ in the aftermath of the attack which killed Adam Rogers.
Antonio Ruiz-Clough, 19, confronted Nicholas Ellarby who was chasing Adam Rogers’ attacker and told him ‘if you’ve got a problem with them, you’ve got a problem with me’, before butting him in the face.
Yesterday Clough, of Bridge Street, Rishton, was sent to a Young Offenders Institute for 12 months.
He had pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm on the first day of trial in January.
His co-defendant, Jonathan David Seal, 20, of Cliff Street, Rishton, was given six months, suspended for two years after Judge Stuart Baker said the punch he threw at Adam Rogers’ friend Carl Rutherford was ‘not totally unprovoked’.
Earlier, the court had heard that Clough had successfully applied for his own discharge from the Army 10 days ago because a seven-month tour of Afghanistan had left him with post traumatic stress disorder.
Letters from senior Army officers to the judge described him as a ‘born leader’, a ‘very good role model’ and ‘an outstanding soldier’.
Richard Simons, defending Clough, quoted one letter saying: “We cannot afford to lose such a good soldier. We need more people like Antonio Ruiz-Clough in the Army.”
The court heard he had carried a stricken colleague hit by an improvised explosive device to safety, only for him to die from his injuries.
However, Rowena Goode, prosecuting, said Clough was summoned in front of a court martial in December 2007, days before his first tour of Afghanistan, after headbutting another soldier.
He was given a 90-day sentence in a military corrective training facility, suspended for one year.
Seal was given a suspended sentence, also for assault occasioning actual bodily harm and must carry out 200 hours unpaid work. His barrister Richard Bennett said he accepted his actions had ‘gone beyond reasonable self-defence’.
The court heard he came from a ‘good family’, had no previous convictions and was in settled employment and a relationship.
Judge Baker told both defendants: “Sadly, I don’t find the circumstances to be particularly unusual.
“Sitting here day after day after day I have an almost endless succession of cases where young men choose to go out and become far too affected by alcohol then for little or no reason resort to violence.
“Decent folk who might want to go out into the town centre for legitimate reasons feel intimidated to do so.
"The public rightly express real concern about drunken street violence.
“In many cases a custodial sentence in principle is the right sentence to impose to indicate to the public the courts take a serious view of young men drinking and behaving in a violent way.
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