Kirkby man assaulted former best friend and smashed his door with a claw hammer
A Kirkby man who assaulted his former best friend after blaming him for getting social services involved with his family has been sentenced.
Becky Allsop, prosecuting, said Daniel Evans had been "particularly good and close friends" with his neighbour for a number of years but fell out with him after he called the police because of domestic incidents.
A social worker described him as “particularly angry” and heard him shouting and swearing at his partner before there was a loud bang on April 23.
Evans pounded on his neighbour’s door with a claw hammer and smashed a £500 glass pane, shouting: “Wait until you come out tomorrow.”
He initially denied criminal damage and was on police bail, on condition he had no contact with his neighbour, when he confronted the man on May 5.
He was filmed gesticulating and posturing while two older women tried to keep them apart but he managed to throw two punches.
Evans grabbed his neighbour's hand and bent it back, breaking the skin. When his victim hit him back Evans ran across the road, shouting “assault, assault.”
He fell over a garden wall and writhed on the ground after trying to pull his victim over it. He was arrested with four small bags of amphetamine.
The court heard he has 17 previous convictions for 31 offences and was last in trouble in 2016.
Donna Pursglove, mitigating, said Evans had a very difficult upbringing which led him into heroin addiction and later alcohol and amphetamine abuse.
“It is really, really sad the relationship has ended the way it has,” she said. “They were really good friends. He and his partner have to work on their own issues. An immediate custodial sentence would punish him but it will not address the issues identified in the probation report.”
Evans, 33, of Sycamore Avenue, Kirkby, and currently of Darlton Street, Mansfield, admitted assault, possession of drugs and criminal damage, when he appeared at Mansfield Magistrates Court on May 9.
On Thursday he received a 12 month community order with 12 rehabilitation days and a six-month alcohol treatment plan. He was ordered to pay £350 compensation. A three-year restraining order was imposed.
The presiding magistrate told him: “The alternative is prison. This is your big chance to get your life back on track.”