A THUG who broke a man’s jaw then made him give evidence against him has been jailed for nearly three years.

The victim had to have two plates inserted into his face and has been left permanently affected by Leon Philip Derek Feasey’s single punch, York Crown Court heard.

He had stepped in as a peacemaker when Feasey “took umbrage” to a man 5ft tall with physical issues and put him to the ground outside the Bay Horse in Selby last March, said the Honorary Recorder of York, Judge Paul Batty QC.

“This was not a momentary loss of temper,” the judge said. “In my judgement, it was clear it was premeditated, it was vicious and you have behaved in a similar fashion in the past.”

He said the victim, who had been at the pub for a tournament, had had a pleasant day until the incident with Feasey.

Feasey, 24, of no fixed address and formerly of Dringhouses, was jailed for 32 months.

For Feasey, Graham Parkin said he had lost everything. He had lost his job when he was charged with the offence which led to the loss of his accommodation and the woman he struck up a relationship with shortly after the incident had broken it off when she found out about what he had done.

Feasey stood trial for causing grievous bodily harm and had indicated he would claim that he had acted in self-defence.

Both the victim and a woman in the pub gave evidence against him.

When the judge ruled that the jury were entitled to hear about his several previous convictions for violence, he changed his plea to guilty.

“You are, in my judgement, completely devoid of remorse, or you would not have contested this case in the cynical way you did,” the judge told him.

Feasey was on a suspended sentence for kneeing his then partner in the face at the time of the pub incident, and pleaded guilty to vandalising a parked car’s wing mirror at night a couple of weeks after the pub incident.

The judge gave him 30 months for the pub assault, plus two months from the suspended sentence.