A TEENAGER who stabbed a boy in the groin during a gang fight has been ordered to complete a youth rehabilitation order.

The 17-year-old member of North Young Guns, or NYG, had been on trial accused of producing a knife during a scrap arranged on Facebook.

But after two days of evidence at Swindon Crown Court in April he indicated he would plead guilty to a lesser offence.

Judge Douglas Field imposed a community order, pointing out the boy was the only one in the dock for the organised violence which involved up to 50 youths.

The teenager was on trial for wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm when the case was stopped so he could admit affray.

Marcus Davey, defending, said his client admitted the public order offence on the basis he did not use a knife to cause the injury.

“It was on the basis he caused an injury. The Crown will not say it was with a knife,” he said.

“He was 16 at the time and is not to be sentenced on the basis it was a knife: be it a key or glass he used.”

Passing sentence the judge said as well as being alone in being prosecuted he was making a new life for himself having moved away, was growing up and attending college.

He put him on a 15-month youth rehabilitation order with 30 hours of activity requirement and a five-day programme on thinking and behaviour with the use of weapons.

The boy, who used to live in the Lawns area before moving to Richmond, Surrey, was also told he must not contact four witnesses in the case, including the boy he stabbed.

The jury had been told the NYG gang, who operated near the Orbital Shopping Centre in north Swindon, had been taunting other teenagers on Facebook.

Giving evidence by video link the boy who was stabbed said they had decided to stand up to them. and a fight was arranged for Wednesday March 6 at a children’s play area called the Blue Park, in nearby Haydon End.

Minutes before the fight one of the victim’s group said he received a voicemail message from the defendant threatening to shank him, meaning stab him, in the groin.

Rob Welling, prosecuting, told the court the defendant said: ‘I’m going to shank you, innit, I’m gong to cut off your bits. Come on, North Guns all day’.

The defendant, who also received a severe beating, said he had attacked the victim using a piece of glass he had picked up from a bottle which had been smashed over his head.

He said he was acting in self defence.

The victim and his friends said they saw a knife and any beating was meted out after the stabbing, not before.