A WEDDING at the luxury Coombe Abbey Hotel turned into a wedding nightmare when a drunk brother bit off part of the groom’s uncle’s chin – and hurled racist abuse at security guards.
After turning up drunk to his twin brother’s wedding, violent Richard Coleman bit his uncle to the chin so hard that it left a flap of skin hanging down.
He also bit his uncle to the arm and hurled vile racist abuse at the two black security officers.
Jailing Coleman (32) of Newport Street, Walsall, for a total of 23 months, a judge at Warwick Crown Court said he had used his teeth like ‘a wild animal.’
After failing to turn up for a previous hearing, at which a warrant was issued for his arrest, Coleman had pleaded guilty at a pre-trial hearing to unlawful wounding, two charges of racially aggravated harassment, and failing to surrender to custody.
Recapping the case, Judge Barry Berlin said that on 31 December 2016 Coleman turned up drunk to his twin brother’s wedding at Coombe Abbey, and was making a nuisance of himself.
His uncle John Gardner tried to calm him down and took him out into the lobby area of the hotel, and he was then prevented from going back in.
Without warning, Coleman began punching and headbutting Mr Gardner, who reacted by punching him back.
As security staff moved in to try to separate them, Coleman bit his uncle hard to the chin.
And Judge Berlin told him: “I have seen photographs of that. It’s a deep cut, with a fold of skin hanging off his chin, which has left him with a permanent scar.”
Coleman then tried to bit Mr Gardner’s forearm, calling him a ‘little ginger ****’ and threatening to stamp on his head.
He made ‘monkey noises’ towards the two black security guards, hurling abuse at them and telling them to ‘go home,’ which the judge sarcastically observed was ‘charmingly said after the events of biting your uncle.’
And he told Coleman, whose previous convictions included an assault on another member of his family: “You used your teeth in the way a wild animal may do.
“This is aggravated by the racial comments you made, and you were drunk.
“Another aggravating feature is the nature of the wound itself. This was a serious and unpleasant wound.”
The judge said Coleman had made ‘a deliberate attempt to evade justice’ for over a year before being arrested after failing to attend for a hearing last year.
But he added: “There is no offending since December 2016, which is the best mitigation apart from your plea, which was belated.”
