Assault victim claims he was denied justice

Feb 22 2008 By Gary Fanning

A TEENAGER who was left for dead in a Hamilton street this week slammed the justice system — after the two men accused of attacking him walked free.

Scott Donald (20) and 21-year-old William Brown were cleared of assaulting Scott Martin in Eddlewood’s Thornton Place on June 22 last year.

Scott Martin (17), this week claimed he had been denied justice.

He suffered a swollen face, black eye, swollen lip and other cuts and bruises to his face during the attack.

Three stitches were inserted into a head wound.

Scott collapsed on the ground after he was hit in the head with a bottle.

While he was down, his attackers repeatedly kicked and stamped on his head and body.

The former Hamilton Grammar and Woodside Primary pupil lay unconscious for about 25 minutes before being taken to hospital in an ambulance.

Scott, a trainee construction engineer, relived his horror ordeal.

He said: “I could have ended up dead that night if they had attacked me for a second longer.

“I am angry that nothing has been done about it.

“My attackers ran up the street, hit me with a glass bottle and jumped up and down on my face.

“I feel lucky to be alive.”

Scott and his partner Danielle Springett, 17, were at the Hamilton Palace Nightclub on the night of the attack.

Danielle said they were having a row when one of Scott’s attackers got involved and a fight broke out inside the club.

But Donald, of Coniston Crescent , Hamilton, and Brown, of Meadowside, Hamilton, were both found not guilty of attacking Danielle and Scott Martin in the Hamilton Palace Night Club on June 22 last year.

After the row, Scott Martin and Danielle (17) were escorted out of the nightclub, and went home in a taxi.

Scott was speaking to his dad on mobile phone outside Danielle’s home in Thornton Place when his attackers pounced.

Danielle, who is three months pregnant, said: “After they hit him with the bottle and he fell to the ground, they were jumping on his head and the side of his face.

“After he was unconscious, they continued to jump on his face.

“One more jump to the side of the neck could have killed him.

“A bootprint was left on the side of his face.

“I thought he was dead because I couldn’t see him breathing. His face and jumper were covered in blood. It was horrific.”

Danielle’s mum Karen (36), said: “After Scott was hit with the bottle he said he just lay down and gave up.

“It was an inch away from murder.

“We can’t understand why the accused got away with it. The lawyers turned it around and said that Scott Martin attacked them.

“You raise your children to trust in the court system and trust in the police.

“We don’t want a vigilante society ... but where is the justice?”

Danielle said that following the attack Scott fears leaving home at night and doesn’t see his friends anymore.

She added: “He doesn’t want to go to pubs or Palace anymore and stays in the house. He is very wary of people and not comfortable around them.

“Thugs are viciously attacking people and getting away with it.

“If they have done to him, who else are they getting away with it on.”

Brown was fined £500 after he was found guilty of carrying an offensive weapon, a belt, in Hamilton’s Strathaven Road on June 22 last year.