JAILED: Teenager stabbed victim, 16, in pub after he 'ran for his life' in bid to escape
A teenager who stabbed a 16-year-old youth, leaving him close to death, has been locked up for more than seven years.
Daniel Watson had an unspecified 'issue' with the victim, who rode into trouble on his bike in Croft Lane, Fallings Park, where the 18-year-old was standing with several other people on May 29, Wolverhampton Crown Court was told.
"Anticipating an attack he got off the bike, threw it at the group and ran for his life pursued by some, or all, of the group, " explained Mr Edmund Blackman, prosecuting.
The terrified youth ran across gardens and leapt over fences while doubling back to where he had started. A witness later told police: "His face was full of fear and desperation."
Watson picked up and rode the victim's discarded bike when the chase returned to Croft Lane and closed the gap to the 16-year-old who sought sanctuary in the Otter and Vixen pub.
The defendant leapt off the machine and burst into the pub where he stabbed the victim in front of startled customers, continued Mr Blackman.
CCTV showed him being knifed in the groin with a blow that severed an artery but the other wound in his back, which damaged a kidney so badly it had to be removed, was not caught by security cameras.
Watson fled from the scene, dumping the knife in a hedge as he ran away down Croft Lane. The weapon was found soon afterwards and had the blood of the victim on the 18 cm long blade.
The youth was taken to Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital in a critical condition and underwent an emergency operation followed by seven separate surgical procedures during which a kidney was removed and the wound to the top of his left left was covered with a skin graft. He spent 15 days in an induced coma and was not discharged until July 6.
He said later: "This is going to affect me for the rest of my life. I am currently having kidney dialysis and may have to continue with it." His sister told the court: "He said he wished he had just been killed."
Mr Christopher O'Gorman, defending, said that Watson had endured a difficult upbringing but had faced up to his responsibilities by admitting the crime.
The defendant from Tennyson Road, Low Hill, pleaded guilty to wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and possession of a knife and was sentenced to seven and a half years detention at a Young Offenders Institution.
Judge James Burbidge QC told him: "This was a most cowardly attack but the cause of which is not clear. You said you had an issue with him but could not remember what.
"You stabbed him in the groin and it is highly suggestive that you were responsible for the first stab wound because nobody else was near to him. You nearly killed him.
