Jail for life-threatening attack

Sentence was passed at Edinburgh Sheriff Court

A convicted drug trafficker who left a pedestrian with life-threatening head injuries in Edinburgh has been jailed for 17-and-a-half months.

Joth Singh had been freed early from prison when he punched Eric Wingate to the ground in the Cowgate in November 2007, leaving him unconscious.

Mr Wingate, 31, suffered a fractured skull and underwent emergency surgery to fit titanium plates in his head.

Singh pleaded guilty to the assault last month at Edinburgh Sheriff Court.

Mr Wingate, from Australia, was walking along the Cowgate in Edinburgh after attending a dinner at the Institute of Civil Engineers in the city in November last year.

Singh's car appeared beside him and stopped and Mr Wingate collided with it then kicked the vehicle.

Singh, who had passed his driving test just two days earlier, got out and walked round to the pavement and punched his victim in the face, knocking him to the ground.

Panic attacks

Mr Wingate was rushed to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary where doctors said he would have died had he not been given emergency brain surgery.

Police traced married father-of-two Singh to a house in Piershill Square East in Edinburgh after the attack.

He pleaded guilty to assaulting Mr Wingate, severely injuring him, endangering his life, and leaving him permanently impaired and disfigured.

Mr Wingate spent weeks in hospital and has suffered panic attacks, head aches, nausea, severe vertigo and break-downs and can no longer work full-time.

Doctors have told him most of the symptoms should improve over time.

In August 2005, Singh was jailed for 33 months at the High Court in Glasgow after acting as a courier for heroin on a train journey from Birmingham to Edinburgh's Waverley Station.

He was released early from the sentence in August 2006.

At the High Court in Edinburgh earlier this month, he was sent back to prison to serve three months of the unexpired portion of the earlier sentence.

Defence solicitor advocate Ray Megson said the car had been Singh's "pride and joy" and he did not know Mr Wingate was unconscious when he drove off.