Murder bid man guilty

0 - 0 • Published 17 Jun 2009 18:08

A BARRHEAD man has been convicted of a brutal murder bid on an innocent T-in-the-Park reveller.

Robert Kidd, of Grampian Way grinned in court as he and John Tiffoney, 25, of Cardiff were both found guilty after a six-day long trial.

They both stabbed Mark Morrison, 23, eleven times in a frenzied attack at the music festival in Balado on July 13 last year.

Mr Morrison had told the High Court in Dunfermline he had returned to his tent and was looking at photographs on a digital camera with friends when they heard an argument developing outside between another of their friends.

Mark and a female friend then left the tent and she approached the man arguing with her friend and said: 'Don"t talk to her like that.'

Mr Morrison said a man then spat on the girl and punched her on the head so he grabbed him and a fight broke out.

He told the court: 'The next thing I knew there was somebody on my back. 'I assumed it was his friend that was with him.

'I felt blows on my back several times.

'Then I felt myself struggling to breathe.

'I got up to try to get myself away. I thought I had been winded or at worst cracked a rib.

'I walked up by our tent and fell to my knees.

'Two of my friends and someone I didn"t know came over to see if I was OK. I didn"t even know I had been stabbed until one of them shouted, "He"s been stabbed".'

When taken to the festival"s medical tent Mr Morrison had to have a chest drain inserted as the stab wounds had punctured his lung.

His injuries included six stab wounds on his back, three on his right side, one on the left of his mouth and one on the side of his head.

Mr Morrison, from Airdrie, still has a scar on his face as a result of the attack.

A month after attempting to murder Morrison, Kidd was involved in a six hour stand-off with police.

He brandished a Samurai sword at four plain clothed cops who entered his back garden to arrest him.

He then threatened to stab them, climbed through a window onto the roof of a bungalow in Auchenback.

Kidd was arrested when later talked down by police negotiators.

Judge Lord Woolman told both thugs they had been found guilty of "a disgraceful series of crimes".

He said: 'You assaulted three females and then you attempted to murder the man who went to their aid.

'The victims went to the T-in-the- Park festival to have a good time. They went with friends to listen to live music and to enjoy themselves.

'They did not go to become involved in mindless assaults, and they did not expect that one of their number would be stabbed in the back and side with a knife.'

He sentenced both to nine years imprisonment.

Lord Woolman also jailed Kidd for a further six months imprisonment for the breach of the peace, to be served consecutive to the nine years.

He said Kidd"s conduct when police arrived at his home had been 'alarming and unacceptable.'

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This article appeared in Barrhead News 17 Jun 09

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