Honda worker who glassed woman she didn't know outside nightclub

Cori Pincombe, of Surrey Road, had denied she was the woman responsible for the injury to the woman at Elevation in Gloucester - although she accepted being present at the club at the time.

But, after a four-day trial at Gloucester Crown Court, Pincombe was convicted by a jury of seven women and five men of unlawfully wounding the woman on January 30 of last year.

However, the jury cleared her of the more serious charge of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

The injury to the woman's cheek, which had needed forty stitches, was "ghastly" and the aggravating features were lack of remorse, use of a weapon, and Pincombe's previous convictions, which included a 2008 conviction for assault, the judge, Recorder Paul Grumbar, said.

He found that there was "greater harm and higher culpability" and that it was a Category One offence of its kind, he said.

But he accepted there had been only a single blow.

Today at Gloucester Crown Court prosecutor, Charles Thomas, asked the judge to consider imposing a restraining order.

Bbut the judge said: “They didn't know each other, there was no previous history between them, she has been on bail without incident. I don't feel that this is a case for a restraining order.”

Defending Pincombe, Sarah Jenkins said: “There was a single blow. Plainly an isolated incident of a very short duration from what we saw on CCTV footage.

“She is the primary carer for her seven-year-old son. She was born in Devon, and raised in her early years there, before moving to Swindon aged 10.

“Her parents separated, and she resided in Swindon with her father and his partner, a woman she calls her step mother. She did not have a happy relationship with her step mother.

“When she was 15 she moved out of that home, and moved in with a family who she was friends with from school. She found herself getting into trouble with her friends. She remained in Swindon.

“However when she was 18 there was a bereavement. She went into a spiral of drinking too much, but at aged 19 she moved to Gloucester and had her son. She lived in Gloucester raising her son.

“Following this incident, she decided to return to Swindon. She has been living there since September last year. She was a shift manager at the Honda factory.

“Despite what was said yesterday, there is genuine remorse for the outcome and it's effects. A genuine regret as far as she is concerned. This would be her first experience of a custodial sentence,” Mrs Jenkins said.

• Glassing woman convicted as not guilty plea dismissed

The judge said to Pincombe: “In the last few days I've heard an account of what happened, which courts throughout this country hear over and over again.

“Young people like you, with responsibilities and intelligence, for reasons that are hard to fathom, go out and inexplicably have confrontations with people you don't even know.

“I don't understand why you didn't leave with your friends. You were having a horrible time. But you didn't and then there was this childish, absurd confrontation.

“You showed absolutely no signs of remorse at all. When the police arrived you were calm and collected, when in fact you had just smashed a bottle on Ms Griffiths' head.

“Keiran Rimmer, although he didn't really know you, tried to restrain you, to dissuade you from the confrontation you were determined to have.

“The jury rightly found that you caused the injury, but were not sure you intended to cause that level of harm, despite picking up the bottle and smashing it over the woman's head.

“It was a simply ghastly injury that you caused. This is a category one offence with greater harm and higher culpability. There is the use of a weapon. This was in a public place, late at night. You have previous convictions and you had been drinking.

“You have responsibilities, and this was a single blow. I believe, perhaps somewhat generously, that you've learnt your lesson.

“If you'd been convicted of the more serious offence, the sentence would have been terrifyingly long.

“You demonstrated a lack of control. The cut went around the corner of her jaw. If it had gone further down, you could have killed her.

“The jury clearly found you didn't intend to inflict the dreadful injury,” the judge concluded.

The jury had heard that there was ill feeling between the two women in the club and it spilt out onto the street where the woman was gashed in the face and suffered a 10cm cut.

The scar on her right cheek was still clearly visible as she gave evidence about what happened as she left the club with her friends that morning.

She said Pincombe had been barging her and glaring at her in the club.

Outside the club, she said, she was waiting for a taxi and was going back with friends to continue the night's outing.

She heard a friend of hers telling Pincombe she was not coming with them but Pincombe was saying 'I'll go where I want. I can do what I want. I don't care what anyone says.'

She said: "I walked over and said 'You're not coming.' I told her she was not welcome. About 10 seconds after I felt a massive blow to my head.

"There was blood everywhere, coming from my right cheek.”

• Honda has asked us to make it clear that Pincombe was an agency worker at the factory.