Brutal attack left Coventry student with life-changing injuries

[dutchman]

His degree and employment prospects are now in doubt, and he is not allowed to play sport or drive a car



A student suffered life-changing injuries when he was brutally attacked in a Coventry park as he walked home from a night out.

The young man suffered a fractured skull, broken cheek bones, a broken eye socket, a broken nose and bleeding on the brain in the horrific attack in Primrose Hill Park, Hillfields.

His degree and employment prospects are now in doubt, and he is not allowed to play sport, go to the gym or drive a car for at least 18 months.

And his furious mum says she had to write a scathing letter to the chief constable to get officers to even interview her son about what happened.

The Coventry University engineering student was walking through the park in the early hours of June 24 after celebrating the end-of-year exams with four friends when he was attacked.

He was in a high dependency unit at University Hospital Coventry for eight days after the vicious attack.

The family, from Oxfordshire, only heard back from West Midlands Police more than 15 days after the attack - and only after his mum wrote a scathing letter to the Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, Dave Thompson.

The student, who is currently recovering at home, will need major surgery to fix his skull.

Speaking to CoventryLive, his mum said: "He's sleeping a lot and he's not doing a lot.

"He doesn't really want to go back there and we don't know whether he's going to be able to because there is a three-month recovery period after the surgery."

She also said she was angry with the police for blaming the victim.

She added: "Almost three weeks later they've [West Midlands Police] decided they are going to interview him.

"The thing that made me really angry is that my son is studying in Coventry and he's not from Coventry, he doesn't know the area.

"The police made out it was not a good area and it was a no-go area and he shouldn't have been there, but it wasn't his fault.

"I saw their Snapchat stories from the night and they weren't being aggressive, they were just having fun."

The force admitted it had "failed the victim" by not classifying the offence properly.

[dutchman]

The horrific injuries suffered by student in brutal park attack



These are the horrific injuries a Coventry University student sustained in a brutal park attack.

The engineering student's skull was fractured in the violent attack in Primrose Hill Park, Hillfields , on June 24.

Now his life is on hold as he waits for major surgery to repair his forehead.

His degree and employment prospects are in doubt, and he is not allowed to play sport, go to the gym or drive a car for at least 18 months.

If you have any information, or witnessed the attack, call the force on 101.

Alternatively, you can contact Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

[dutchman]

Park attacker given ten years...

After hearing that attacker Abdul Abdul had a previous conviction for a similar incident, a judge passed a sentence which means he could be behind bars for more than ten years.

The judge told Abdul, who had kicked his victim George Savva to the head: “Not only was he lucky to live, but you were lucky he lived.”

Abdul (30) of Coventry Street, Coventry, had pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to charges of inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent and assault.

He was given an extended sentence of ten-and-a-half years in prison, of which he will have to serve at least two-thirds before the Parole Board will even considered his release.

He will be freed before serving the whole sentence only if the Parole Board considers it safe to do so – and will then be on licence for the rest of the term and for a further three-and-a-half years.

Prosecutor Martin Liddiard added that Abdul had a record for violence, and in 2010 had been jailed for four years and eight months for grievous bodily harm with intent after he attacked a man in a bar in Weston-Super-Mare, breaking his jaw and leaving the imprint of his trainer on the victim’s neck.

Jailing Abdul, Deputy Judge Richard Griffith-Jones told him: “This is a grave offence. It was a hard kick from a powerful man to a man who was vulnerable after you had taken his legs from under him.

“The damage you did was enormous. In one sense, not only was he lucky to live, you were lucky he lived, because the only question would have been whether it was murder or manslaughter.

“That this is from someone whose pattern of offending and previous convictions for causing grievous bodily harm with intent demonstrates to me that you are a danger.”

[dutchman]

Abdul Abdul could spend over a decade behind bars for the attack on a Coventry University student