Iron bar yob gets 12 years

A BUILDER from Sheffield who battered a man so severely he was left permanently brain damaged and unable to walk has been jailed for 12 years.

Jon Bushell, 26, of Wolfe Drive, Foxhill, used a metal bar to batter father-of-one Detcho Stoyanov following a row in an Oxfordshire pub.

Mr Stoyanov was so badly injured doctors gave him just a five per cent chance of survival. He is now tetraplegic - meaning he does not have the use of his arms and legs - and barely able to speak.

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Mr Stoyanov's friend Brian Lidon was also severely injured in the street attack, some of which was witnessed by a passing taxi driver.

Bushell denied two counts of attempted murder and two of causing grievous bodily harm with intent when he appeared before Oxford Crown Court.

He was convicted of both GBH charges by a jury but cleared of the attempted murder charges - much to the disgust of his victims' families.

His co-accused Paul Dawson, 26, of Findon Crescent, Hillsborough, was cleared of all charges against him, two counts of GBH with intent and one of assisting an offender.

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He was also awarded 800 defence costs for attending the trial.

Sentencing Bushell to 12 years imprisonment Judge Julian Hall said: "You are a man that gets drunk and gets into fights in pubs, you have two convictions for that.

"Mr Stoyanov is going to have to be looked after by other people forever and it's all your fault."

Speaking outside the court, Mr Stoyanov's father Stoyan Dechev Stoyanov spoke of his disgust at the verdict and sentence.

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Through an interpreter he said: "I'm not happy with the jury's decision and the sentence for Jon Bushell is too small.

"This is a person who doesn't have any conscience. The whole time throughout the trial he was smiling."

Brian Lidon said: "There is no way you can hit someone four or five times over the heard and not be trying to kill them."

The court heard that on November 4 last year Bushell and been drinking at the Forester's Arms pub in Stoney Stratford, Milton Keynes, with Dawson.

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Mr Stoyanov, 37, a Bulgarian builder who has lived in Britain since 1996, was in the same pub with Mr Lidon, a 31-year-old construction director, when a fight broke out.

Mr Stoyanov and Mr Lidon then left the pub and made their way along London Road, Stoney Stratford, where they were set upon.

Neither victim remembers the attack and Mr Stoyanov was in a coma when paramedics arrived.

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