Man wins appeal over screwdriver attack on boxer Gwyn

“Very large” William Edward Lowe (45), was “trying to wind up” boxer Gwyn Wale and “offered to fight him” before the pair engaged in fisticuffs, London’s Appeal Court heard.

Mr Wale was much smaller than Lowe but, as a trained boxer, was “getting the better of the fight” and had knocked out Lowe’s two front teeth before the bigger man pulled out a screwdriver and began stabbing his opponent.

In the fight at Brampton Bierlow, Mr Wale suffered two life-threatening wounds, one of which pierced the sac of his heart, causing it to fill with blood.

Lowe, of Edward Street, Great Houghton, pleaded guilty to inflicting grievous bodily harm and was jailed for four years at Sheffield Crown Court in March.

But Lord Justice Laws, Mr Justice Mitting and Mr Justice Edwards Stuart, cut that term to three years, two months.

The court heard Mr Wale had been building a brick wall for a neighbour when Lowe approached him and began causing trouble.

Mr Justice Edwards-Stuart deplored the “repeated and violent use of a screwdriver” by Lowe, saying: “It makes this offence one of high culpability.”

But he agreed to cut Lowe’s sentence after his lawyers submitted that the attack “really amounted to the use of excessive force in self defence.”

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