A thug has been sent to jail for two years after his brutal attack on a young man in Stonehaven left his victim with a life-threatening head injury.
Stuart Duguid’s victim suffered bleeding on the brain and almost died after the assault in the town’s High Street on May 16.
His mother was so horrified that after seeing news coverage of the incident she turned him in to senior police officers probing the attack.
Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard Duguid had called her ahead of the incident, leaving her concerned he sounded “irrational” and “was ranting” while slurring his words.
A short time later, witnesses saw him walking up and down the pavement on High Street before throwing “four or five” punches in quick succession to a man’s head.
His victim fell to the ground, striking the left side of his head off the pavement as he toppled.
Depute fiscal John Richardson said witnesses reported the man was breathing with “sporadic gasps” and had been taken to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary for emergency surgery, having sustained a subdural haematoma.
He told the court Duguid had confided in his mother that he had been in “a bit of a scrap” before returning home.
When she saw news coverage of the assault online, however, she became concerned her son had been involved.
Though she was said to have been confident he would turn himself in, she nonetheless called 99 and gave officers his address. He was arrested a short time later.
During their investigation, police closed Stonehaven High Street between its junctions with Bogwell Lane and the Cool Gourmet tearoom.
Officers in white body suits were seen inspecting parts of the pavement and one doorway leading to a property.
Sentencing him to a lengthy period behind bars yesterday, Sheriff Jack Brown told Duguid, described as a prisoner at HMP Grampian: “You have pleaded guilty to an assault to severe injury and danger of life.
“You are lucky you are not at the High Court on a charge of culpable homicide.
“If he had passed away you would have been responsible for that.”