A man who left a neighbour with a partially collapsed lung in a stabbing in a Brechin park has been jailed for four years.
Warring neighbours Kevin Sorrie and brothers 27-year-old Kaelan and Daniel Platt, 22, crossed paths in the town’s public park where Sorrie stabbed the older brother before heading home.
Police later seized a mud-caked jacket stained with Mr Platt’s blood, stuffed beneath a bed in Sorrie’s Wards Road home.
They also found a wooden-handled kitchen knife behind the taps on an upstairs bathroom sink.
A jury at Forfar Sheriff Court took just an hour and a half to convict Sorrie of the life-endangering assault.
Sorrie, 41, was previously jailed in 2011 for a serious assault.
Collapsed lung
Victim Kaelan Platt arrived at Ninewells emergency department just after 6pm on October 21, having been brought by ambulance.
He had a stab wound on the left side of his chest and had to receive oxygen.
An x-ray of his chest showed a pneumothorax – leaking air – which confirmed he had sustained a punctured left lung.
Part of his left lung had collapsed and it was managed with a chest drain.
This was removed on October 24 and he was prescribed morphine and discharged from hospital a day later.
Accused claimed he was victim
Sorrie, from Aberdeen but currently in HMP Perth, denied taking a knife to the park and assaulting Mr Platt.
Giving evidence, he explained that earlier that day, the tyres of his partner’s car had been slashed and its windscreen had been smashed.
Sorrie said he had later been walking home with a pregnant teenager when he was assaulted by the Platt brothers in the park.
He said they had been shouting about blaming him for their father’s death.
He said: “I was scared for her (the teen’s) safety as well as my own.”
He said he was struck by a rock, fell and was kicked, then used a knife brought by Kaelan Platt while he was being pinned down.
“I stabbed him with the knife and pushed him away.
“It all happened so fast. It was a situation I didn’t expect to be in.”
However, jurors were shown CCTV of Sorrie and the girl arriving back at Wards Road, entirely unimpaired by the alleged ambush.
Police arrived and detectives searched Sorrie’s home.
Under a bed, they found a navy mud-stained Karrimor anorak with Mr Platt’s blood on it.
A kitchen knife with Sorrie’s DNA on the handle was also found on an upstairs bathroom sink.
Serious matter
Sorrie’s defence was rejected by a majority of the jury and he was found guilty of life-endangering assault to severe injury – under provocation – and weapon possession.
The prosecution did not proceed with a charge alleging Sorrie also assaulted Daniel Platt by striking him on the body with a knife.
Prosecutor Gavin Letford explained Sorrie had been on remand since appearing in court at a private hearing on October 23.
Defence counsel Charles Ferguson said: “A custodial sentence is almost inevitable.
“He has been out of trouble for a considerable time.”
The lawyer pointed out Sorrie’s last conviction was ten years ago.
Sheriff Mungo Bovey stated had it not been for the provocation, Sorrie could have expected the maximum five-year sentence available.
Prior offending
Following his conviction, Mr Letford explained that in 2011, Sorrie was jailed for 21 months at Aberdeen Sheriff Court for an assault to severe injury and permanent disfigurement and possession of a saw in a public place.
As a teenage learner driver, Sorrie wound up in court after he rammed a police car then sped off at 90mph in 2002.
He appeared at Aberdeen Sheriff Court after a police patrol car was confronted by his E-reg Vauxhall Nova car going the wrong way in a one-way street the year before.
When an officer told him to stop, he replied: “No, am I f***.”
He drove forward, colliding with the police car and two parked vehicles, then fled.
Sorrie, of Exchange Street, Aberdeen, also admitted a later charge of being just over the drink drive limit and driving carelessly in the grounds of Aberdeen College.
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