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Electronic tag for father who knocked out man over motocross row

A father knocked another man unconscious after a heated argument over their sons competing at a motocross event.

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Matthew Bailey was given a suspended sentence

The two fathers had a clash of heads after their teenage sons argued over one of them cutting the other up during the race.

As a result, one father was knocked unconscious and had to go to hospital, while the other – a man from Dudley – was later arrested.

Matthew Bailey, aged 38, initially denied assaulting his victim Andrew Woodhouse causing him actual bodily harm – but changed his plea to guilty on the day of his trial.

Bailey, of Southern Cross, Kingswinford was given a four-month prison sentence suspended for 12 months after being subject to an electronically tagged curfew for 44 days.

Prosecutor Graeme Simpson said the two men’s teenage sons had been racing their motocross bikes at an event near Stratford-upon-Avon in July 2016 when an argument broke out.

Mr Woodhouse’s son was complaining, using offensive language, that Bailey’s son had impeded him and should have given way to him.

As a result, Bailey’s wife went over and began to shout at the other teenager, at which point Mr Woodhouse ‘waded in’ and told her not to talk to his son like that.

“The defendant was nearby, and the prosecution case is that he launched himself at the complainant," said Mr Simpson.

“We say that it’s a deliberate headbutt, the defendant’s case is that there was ‘a coming together of heads.’”

As a result of the blow, Mr Woodhouse, who suffered bruising to his face and two broken teeth, was knocked unconscious and was taken by ambulance to hospital for treatment.

Bailey was asked to leave the site, but was later traced by the police to his place of work.

Jonathan Coode, defending, said: “This was a reckless act. There was no intention of causing injury. Had it been a truly hard blow, one would have expected a broken nose.”

He said the language being used by Mr Woodhouse’s son was ‘quite unseemly,’ which was why Bailey’s wife had got involved, ‘because the complainant’s son had been extremely rude towards her son.’

Mr Coode added that Bailey, who is married with a son and two daughters, has started his own business in steel manufacturing.

Sentencing Bailey, Judge Sylvia de Bertodano told him: “We are here because of something that happened a very long time ago now, an argument which started between teenage sons, and parents became involved.

“You became involved when you should not have. I accept it was reckless, but it caused injuries to the other father."

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