Ciaran McConnell (Image: Dyfed-Powys Police)
Last Updated: 20 seconds ago
A chef who fashioned a weapon from his mobile phone and a sock before smashing it into another man’s head in New Quay has been jailed for 15 months.
Ciaran McConnell, 37, a father of two originally from Ireland, was told by a judge at Swansea Crown Court on Tuesday, September 8, that the blow he landed was “brutal”. His victim was left needing emergency brain surgery.
How the night unfolded
The two men had fallen out inside a sports bar in the seaside town over a pool table, and the row turned physical. The younger man, aged 20, was told to leave.
He moved on to another pub, had two or three pints, and then headed back to the tent where he was camping, intending to sleep before a day on the beach.
At about 1am, though, he got up and walked back to the street outside the sports bar. McConnell, who was working at a fish and chip shop in New Quay at the time, was still inside. On learning the younger man had returned, he removed his socks and asked whether anyone had a pool ball.
He walked out with the socks tucked into his back pocket. As the pair traded challenges to fight, McConnell slid his phone into one of the socks, creating what the court described as an improvised cosh.
The younger man threw punches, and McConnell struck him in the head with the weighted sock.
The injuries
The victim’s head bled heavily and a friend led him away. An ambulance was called, and he suffered a seizure before it arrived.
At Bronglais Hospital, doctors found his skull was fractured, with pieces of bone pushing into his brain. He was taken straight into emergency surgery.
He has been left with a three-and-a-half-centimetre scar. In a victim personal statement, he said the scar reminds him of what happened every time he sees it, and described having to undergo emergency surgery as “extremely frightening and traumatic”.
Searches and a boast
Prosecutors told the court that in the weeks leading up to the attack, McConnell had run 16 online searches for self-defence weapons.
The following day, he told a colleague the other man had started the fight but “I sure as hell finished it”.
The defence
McConnell, of South John Street, New Quay, pleaded guilty at a plea and trial preparation hearing.
His defence argued it was the 20-year-old who had chosen to come back to the bar, that “both men were as bad as each other”, and that McConnell’s actions amounted to “excessive self-defence”. He regretted that things had escalated.
Sentencing
Judge PH Thomas KC told McConnell: “The blow that you struck him with was brutal and its impact substantial and significant.
“It is significant in my view that you had been searching online for self-defence weapons. It is almost as if you were looking for an excuse to try out what you had seen online.”
The judge accepted McConnell had not started the violence and said the “victim was far from blameless”.
McConnell has 13 previous convictions covering 19 offences, among them disorderly behaviour, assault, resisting police, robbery and assault causing actual bodily harm.
He was jailed for 15 months and will spend around 40 percent of that term behind bars.
