An offender who glassed a doorman at a nightclub has been sentenced at the Court of General Delivery.

Maxamilliano Pietro Ingrassia pleaded guilty to wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm at a previous appearance.

The court heard that just after midnight on November 22, 2020, the door manager at 1886 in Regent Street, Douglas, was asked by the designated official to remove a male from the club due to his behaviour.

As the doorman went to remove the man, who was a friend of Ingrassia, he was struck on the head by an object before being hit again by a tumbler glass in his forehead. This caused the glass to shatter and badly cut the doorman.

The men continued to remove Ingrassia’s friend from the club before the doorman attended A&E.

During this time, staff reviewed CCTV and having watched Ingrassia hitting the doorman with the glass, followed him to the third floor where he told them he had cut his hand on broken glass.

When he was later arrested and interviewed by police, he told them he had been at a house in Laxey and was jolly, but not intoxicated.

Ingrassia, aged 22, told officers that he didn’t know the doorman was working in 1886 and he just believed another customer was attacking his friend. He said he had tried to break up what he believed to be an attack and in doing so hit the doorman with his glass.

Prosecutor Hazel Caroon also read from a victim impact statement, in which the doorman said he had worked for five years on the doors without being assaulted and that the assault by Ingrassia had left him ‘wary’ of people when working.

He detailed that as well as missing work due to his injuries, he had quit his other job as a hotel reception manager as he felt uneasy being questioned by people about the injuries to his face and was worried people would believe he had been fighting.

The doorman also noted that Ingrassia’s previous decision to plead not guilty, one he reversed only weeks before his trial, had caused him to worry, not only about the impact on him but also on his colleagues who had witnessed the attack.

He added: ‘It should not be OK for anyone to be glassed or assaulted while doing their job.’

Defence advocate Stephen Wood began his mitigation by handing the court a letter of apology from Ingrassia to his victim and by admitting it ‘wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny if I suggested it didn’t cross the custody threshold’.

Mr Wood also noted that he could not speak for the previous legal advice given to Ingrassia, but that he had pleaded guilty before the trial, by which time Mr Wood was representing him.

The advocate said his client accepted full responsibility for what he had done but repeated that he did not know at the time that the man he hit was a doorman and that Ingrassia had acted impulsively when he saw, what he believed, to be an attack on his friend.

He said Ingrassia, who lives at Highfield Drive, Baldrine, had ‘misread’ the events but accepted that his actions were ‘completely and utterly inappropriate’.

Turning to references from several people, including his employer, who was shocked by the attack Ingrassia committed, Mr Wood said it was ‘completely out of character’ for him.

He added that Ingrassia was capable of learning from his mistakes, had referred himself to Motiv8 when asked by probation to consider why he acted in the way that he did and made an open offer of compensation to the doorman.

In sentencing Ingrassia, Deemster Graeme Cook said he accepted that he didn’t know the man he hit was a doorman, but that he had hit him with a glass, twice, and caused some nasty injuries.

He told him: ‘Once is bad enough, twice removes the suspicion of intent.’

Echoing the words of the doorman, Deemster Cook said that ‘nobody should expect to hit with anything while doing their job’.

He sentenced Ingrassia to 23 months in custody, suspended for two years.

He also ordered Ingrassia to pay £2,000 in compensation to the doorman and court costs of £1,000, to be paid within seven days.