Crowds of men tried to batter each other during a mass brawl in the middle of Liverpool City Centre.
At least one police officer was injured during “widespread violence” in and around Concert Square in 2019. More details of the disorder are being reported for the first time today as two men were sentenced for their roles in it.
Hayden Daord and Jack Simpson both appeared before a judge at Liverpool Crown Court today after admitting to being involved in the fight in the early hours Sunday, February 24. Callum Ross, prosecuting, said police patrolling town spotted “a large melee” break out between multiple groups of men on the square and towards neighbouring Fleet Street.
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While trying to calm the disorder, officers arrested Simpson, who was part of a group that was fighting. Then 20 years old, he subsequently admitted affray after CCTV captured him push and kicking an unidentified man.
Mr Ross said: “Whilst Mr Simpson was apprehended against a wall by officers, one officer then pointed towards another fight that had broken out further down Fleet Street. That officer approached the scuffle with his baton out. The first defendant [Daord] can be seen to hit the officer to the head.”
Daord, now 26, pleaded guilty to assaulting an emergency worker but prosecutors accepted that he didn’t realise his victim was a police officer when he punched him, having hit him without seeing him properly. Trevor Parry-Jones, defending Daord, said he regretted his actions and appealed to the judge not to jail him, referencing the long period that had passed since the incident and the dad’s responsibilities in providing for his child.
Mr Parry Jones said: “He acknowledges he should not have acted the way he did. He acknowledges he was mixing with people he should not have been mixing with. He acknowledges he should not have thrown the punch.” John Wyn Williams, defending Simpson, said he also regretted his actions and had accepted his wrongdoing by pleading guilty.
The judge, Stuart Driver QC, said a range of circumstances, including the age of the case as well as both men’s guilty pleas and the fact the pair had stayed out of trouble since, meant he would suspend their jail terms. Judge Driver told them: “You joined in a widespread incident of violence which included a number of men brawling in a public place at night. You were both drunk at the time.”
Daord, of Byrne Avenue, Rock Ferry, and Simpson, of Ledsham Lane, Chester, were both handed five months in prison, suspended for 12 months.
