A PUB-GOER who attacked a fellow drinker with a bar stool was today given an eight-year extended sentence.
Malcolm Robertson, 29, told his victim he had just split up with his girlfriend and "felt like leathering someone" before repeatedly smashing a bar stool on to his head.
John Waugh, 38, needed six staples to his head wounds and is permanently scar
red after the attack.
Robertson, a self-employed joiner, was ordered to spend four years in jail and a further four on licence after admitting the assault at Edinburgh Sheriff Court last month.
"This was an assault on a man who, until a few minutes' conversation shortly before, had been a stranger to you," said Sheriff Kenneth Maciver.
"What happened was extreme violence and there is no excuse for that.
"I have to consider the issue of public safety," the sheriff added, advising Robertson to get help for his alcohol problem while in prison.
Robertson, who has nine previous convictions for assault and has served a six-year sentence, pleaded guilty to assaulting Mr Waugh to his injury and permanent disfigurement.
Edinburgh Sheriff Court was told the pair were strangers who had chatted while smoking outside the Elm Bar in Elm Row, Edinburgh on August 5, 2007.
A short time later, Robertson approached Mr Waugh and said he had just split up with his girlfriend and "felt like leathering someone".
"I could glass you," he said to Mr Waugh.
Robertson later said he had been unhappy about Mr Waugh's response that "there were plenty more fish in the sea".
Fiscal depute Carol Urquhart told the court: "The accused punched the complainer to the face and proceeded to lift a bar stool and strike the complainer several times on the head.
"It was at this stage that other witnesses intervened and removed the bar stool from the accused.
"The complainer was lying on the floor bleeding from a large wound in his head and the accused at this stage made off."
Mr Waugh was taken to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary with cuts to his head measuring three inches and one and half inches and was found to also have other bruising and swelling.
He will have permanent visible scarring, added the fiscal depute.
Defence agent Victoria Good said Robertson claimed the pair had had an argument and that Mr Waugh had put his hand on Robertson's shoulder.
Robertson, of Chessels Court, Canongate, Edinburgh, was a father-of-two who was "very pleasant" when sober.
"He's a young man who suffers from an alcohol-abuse problem and has done for several years," said Miss Good.
"He is someone who changes drastically when he takes alcohol."
"Mr Robertson is utterly remorseful about this offence," she added.
The full article contains 463 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
