A DEAF and dumb man could face jail for attacking his elderly neighbours in their home after downing eight cans of cider.
Robert Brooks, 47, of Cotswold Road, Branston, admitted assaulting John and Janice Miller, with Mr Miller, who had recently endured a major heart operation, resorting to brandishing an axe and an air rifle to try to get the defendant out of his house.
Claire Spooner, defending, said Brooks, who followed proceedings at Burton Magistrates’ Court through a sign language interpreter, had apparently become annoyed over some gardening work Mr Miller had carried out on a communal area near his home on August 4.
Miss Spooner said Brooks had gone to the Millers’ home and started banging and kicking on the front door for around five minutes before Mr Miller, 72, emerged to confront him.
The pensioner retreated indoors in fright at the defendant’s ‘aggressive’ manner, whereupon Brooks kicked the door with such force that it opened, and ‘sent the couple flying backwards down the hallway’.
Mr Miller picked up an axe to try to scare the defendant, who had entered the hallway and was ‘in a drunken stupor, flailing his arms around’, but he forced the couple into a bedroom, causing Mr Miller to pick up an unloaded air rifle ‘in panic’ to try to scare him off.
After retreating into the hallway, Brooks twice struck Mrs Miller, 62, to the face before ‘staggering out of the door, falling over, getting back on his feet and stumbling across the road to his house’.
Mrs Miller, who sustained swelling and bruising to her arm, right cheek and shoulder, told police: “It really shook me up. I was petrified, not only for myself but also for John, who recently had a triple heart bypass.” Mr Miller, meanwhile, was left with grazing to his arm caused by contact with the door frame while he was trying to restrain the intruder.
Colin Drew, defending, said the offences were ‘an aberration’ for the defendant, who had acted out of ‘frustration’.
Mr Drew said: “My client felt the Millers were mocking and laughing at him because of the garden and also perhaps because of his disability.” The solicitor said Brooks had drunk eight cans of cider and his recollection of the incident was ‘somewhat hazy’.
Mr Drew said: “He has never done anything like this before and this is an extremely salutary lesson for him. He spent a long time in the police station which he found frightening and confusing.
“He has had 12 days to think about what he’s done and has expressed his remorse more than once. He feels ashamed of himself that he should have imposed himself on these people in the way that he did.” Brooks was bailed to reappear at the same court on Monday, September 6, pending completion of an ‘all-options’ report by the probation service, meaning custody will be among the sentencing options open to the bench.
