AN ASSAILANT launched a ‘sustained and unprovoked’ attack on his victim – who he claimed had been harassing his girlfriend’s mother – before confessing to drug-dealing when he was arrested.
Warwick Crown Court heard that Piotr Polakowski explained he had been selling amphetamine to pay his and his mother’s rent.
Polakowski, 24, of Arnold Street, Rugby, was jailed for 16 months after pleading guilty to assault and possessing amphetamine with intent to supply.
Prosecutor Ian Windridge said that in May this year Polakowski went to a home in Bath Street, Rugby, at 4.40 in the morning and began throwing stones at a bedroom window.
When the occupant opened the door, Polakowski began punching him repeatedly in an incident captured by a CCTV camera at a nearby cab office.
His victim was then grabbed and swung round, causing him to fall, and as he was trying to get back to his feet Polakowski kneed him to the face, knocking him back down.
Polakowski pursued him into the road and punched him repeatedly until he fell to the ground, and then kicked him.
Polakowski then drove off, leaving the other man unconscious or semi-conscious in the road.
A neighbour saw the attack and called the police, who arrived shortly afterwards and found the victim with two badly bruised and swollen eyes and bruising and grazing to his shoulder, arms and legs.
However, the victim declined to make a formal complaint.
When Polakowski was arrested, he made an accusation about his victim’s behaviour towards his girlfriend’s mother.
He also admitted he had 69 grams of amphetamine on him.
In his room in a shared house, police found a further 96 grams of the drug.
Mr Windridge said that altogether the amphetamine was worth about £1,600; and Polakowski explained that he had been selling it for around four months to pay his and his mother’s rents.
And of the assault, he told the police the other man had been harassing his girlfriend’s mother, and he had gone round to tell him to stop doing so.
Polakowski, representing himself after failing to arrange to be represented despite two adjournments for him to do so, told the judge: “I can only say I feel very bad about this.
“But everything has a reason, and I was doing this for my mum, to help her. I won’t do it again. I want to change my life for the better.
“I want to be a better person than I am. I would be very pleased if you would give me a chance. You would not regret it.
“I feel very ashamed, very, very ashamed,” he added.
But Judge Stephen Eyre QC told him: “I take account of the fact that you are only 24, and I take account of the fact that you have not been in trouble with the police before.
“But I have to sentence you for two separate offences.
“In the early hours of the morning you went to that man’s house deliberately to exercise control over him. You launched a sustained and unprovoked attack on him.
“I also have to sentence you for drug dealing, in which you were engaged in dealing in amphetamine.”
Jailing Polakowski for ten months for the assault and six months for the amphetamine, he added: “There are guidelines which govern the sentences I must pass. There can be no alternative to an immediate sentence of imprisonment.”
