A former trainee with the French Foreign Legion has been sent to jail for a bottle attack on a woman that left her with three permanent scars.
Iain Fraser (23), of Charles Logan Place, Rosyth, also attacked a man who had invited him home for a drink, leaving his victim in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor, on a separate occasion.
At Dunfermline Sheriff Court on Wednesday, he admitted that on April 28 at an address in Evershed Drive, Dunfermline, he conducted himself in a disorderly manner by repeatedly shouting, swearing, uttering homophobic remarks and encouraging people to fight and committing a breach of the peace, and that this offence was aggravated by prejudice relating to sexual orientation.
He also admitted that on the same date and location he assaulted Lorna Teague, c/o Fife Constabulary, by biting her face, swinging a glass bottle at her and hitting her on the face with the bottle, breaking same all to her severe injury and permanent disfigurement.
Fraser pled guilty to a separate charge that on January 22 at an address in Ramsay Place, Rosyth, he assaulted David Friel, c/o Fife Constabulary, by punching him on the head, causing him to be knocked to the floor and to strike his head on a piece of kitchen equipment.
Depute fiscal Lesley Smith told the court that a party was taking place at the address in Dunfermline and the people there had been drinking from 4pm.
“The accused arrived at the party and later on some of the people were dancing when the accused called his friend a faggot and a poof,” she said. “This was overheard by most of the group there, who complained to him as one of the males was gay and would not be treated in that way. An argument broke out and the accused struggled with the complainer, with both falling to the floor.”
The court heard that a short time later Fraser went outside and was swinging a glass bottle.
“The accused approached the female complainer and smashed the bottle across the right side of her face, resulting in the bottle being broken,” Miss Smith added. “He then ran away. The police and an ambulance were contacted and the woman was taken to Queen Margaret Hospital in Dunfermline. She had two black eyes and has been left with a 2.5cm scar to her right cheek, a 3cm scar behind her left ear and a 2cm scar under her chin.
“The accused was later assessed and found to have a displaced finger and scratches and cuts to his right eye.”
Miss Smith said Fraser had been out drinking in a pub on January 21 when he met Mr Friel in the street and the two got chatting.
“The complainer invited Fraser to his home for a drink,” she said. “They then became involved in an argument about smoking in the kitchen. The complainer was then struck on the head and fell to the floor.
“This woke his mother who came into the room to discover her son lying in a pool of blood. She contacted the emergency services and her son later had to get staples put in a wound to the back of his head.”
Fraser’s solicitor said his client had previously joined the French Foreign Legion, aged around 20, along with 330 trainees.
“Eleven, including my client, made it through and he was offered a position but this meant signing up for six years. After the training he had gone through he decided against it and has told me it is one of his biggest regrets.
“This was stern, physical training. My client returned to civilian life and could not cope so he turned to alcohol and drugs.”
The solicitor said three of the group at the party in the Dunfermline house attacked his client after he had made the homophobic remarks.
“After the complainer had been hit by the bottle she again made to approach my client who told her to go away. He has showed remorse for his actions and sympathy to his victims.”
Sentencing Fraser, Sheriff Craig McSherry told him, “Striking a woman on the face with a bottle is not showing signs of remorse. It is almost inevitable that you will get a custodial sentence you are violent.
“That, coupled with the circumstances where someone invites to their house and you hit him, leaving him in a pool of blood, does not show sympathy.”
Fraser was sentenced to 30 months’ prison.