A jury at Bradford Crown Court yesterday returned a unanimous verdict at the end of a three-day trial, during which Steven Hollindrake, of Spring Bank Rise, Keighley, denied unlawfully wounding Mark McKenna.

Hollindrake's barrister John Elvidge handed in references which described him as a gentleman and indicated that he did a lot of work to help the young and elderly in his community.

But Judge Alistair McCallum told Hollindrake: "The jury has clearly found that you didn't act in self defence. I have heard and seen all the witnesses, and I am satisfied that you deliberately took out that knife and knew it could cause serious injury if you used it in the way that you did."

The jury heard how Mark McKenna had entered the Burlington Arms pub in Market Street with his girlfriend Diane Ryan, her brother David and his wife Jackie for drinks, but after an argument inside they decided to leave.

Mr McKenna described how Jackie and the woman she had argued with inside the pub became embroiled in a scuffle and he had intervened to break up the fight.

He said he then got involved in some pushing with another man before Hollindrake, whom he did not know, approached him and stuck a knife in his left upper arm. At Bradford Royal Infirmary, he underwent an operation on his arm. Even now he still had no feeling in some of the fingers on his left hand.

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