A Toxteth man has been jailed for 16 months for battering a vulnerable fellow YMCA resident with his own Zimmer frame after being called a "nonce". Ryan Graham, 33, also placed 62-year-old Leslie Turton, who suffers from arthritis and walks with a mobility aid, in a chokehold and punched him in the face.
The assault lasted around five minutes, despite hostel workers repeatedly intervening to separate the two men. Graham was seen wiping his eyes in the dock as he was sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court on Tuesday.
Attack at shared accommodation
The court heard that both men lived in shared YMCA accommodation in Toxteth. On August 8, Graham became "drunk and abusive" and picked up a glass bottle, swinging it at the "obviously vulnerable" complainant, prosecutor Iain Criddle said.
Staff separated the two men, but Graham pushed past them to enter Mr Turton's room and placed him in a chokehold. After being pulled away again, he picked up the victim's Zimmer frame and used it to hit him on the head around four to five times. Despite further staff intervention, Graham punched Mr Turton in the face one final time.
Guilty plea and sentencing
Graham admitted the attack when interviewed after his arrest, claiming the complainant had "called him a nonce". He pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and intentional strangulation. His conviction breached a community order imposed in 2024 for previous violence offences.
Callum Ross, defending, told the court: "Your honour may well think that this was, to a degree, some level of impulsive offending. He has, to put it frankly, a chequered past. He accepts that he has been a cannabis user for many years, albeit abstinent when he has been in custody for the past four weeks. He feels that has done him some good."
Mr Ross added that Graham has issues with misusing alcohol and is waiting to go to a rehabilitation centre. He said Graham has had a "short, sharp shock of custody" and knows that if he puts "one single foot wrong, he lands himself straight back in prison".
Judge rejects suspended sentence
District Judge Jack McGarva told Graham: "This is an unpleasant offence. You had been nasty all day with somebody you were not living domestically with but sharing parts of your accommodation. You were verbally abusive to him. You would not let it go. It culminated with you strangling him from behind and then repeatedly beating him with his mobility assistance and punching him to the head."
The judge noted the victim was "nearly double your age" and vulnerable, suffering from arthritis and unable to walk properly. He said Graham had been violent on several occasions in the past and was on a community sentence for violence to a partner at the time of this offence, while also committing two other offences during that order.
Sentencing, Judge McGarva said: "I have been asked to consider whether I should suspend that sentence. In this case, I do not feel that there is a realistic prospect of rehabilitation. You have had your chance, and you have not taken it. There is not particularly strong personal mitigation and immediate custody will not affect anybody else. We cannot have people repeatedly offending while on community orders, using weapons and attacking vulnerable people. I am afraid that I am not able to suspend the sentence."
