A JUDGE has railed against the rough-and-tumble of physical sports ending up in court, as a rugby union player who stamped on an opponent’s head raising a small bruise was cleared of assault.
Andrew Evans, 25, a full-back for Billingham, was initially charged with the more serious charge of causing grievous bodily harm and lived with the threat of a jail sentence for two years before the case came to court. But shortly after the trial started at Newcastle Crown Court Judge Beatrice Bolton ordered the jury to clear him of assault and was scathing that the Crown Prosecution Service ever brought the prosecution. “I am flabbergasted that the CPS wished to continue with this,” Judge Bolton said. “That bruise was the sort that happens within the rough-and-tumble of rugby and is neither here nor there.”