A DRUNKEN thug who cut his girlfriend's face open during a bloody attack with what may have been a knife or broken bottle has walked free.

Lance Norris is pictured here walking along Foregate Street in Worcester while staring at his mobile phone following the attack in the victim's own home in Kidderminster which left her screaming in terror.

Despite being spared jail, the defendant will have to pay his victim £1,200 in compensation for the injuries he inflicted and the distress he caused.

The 32-year-old father, who kept his head bowed in the dock, was given a suspended sentence for wounding at Worcester Crown Court on Wednesday.

Victim Samantha Smith needed internal and external stitches to the 3cm gash near her eye at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham following the 'sustained' assault on September 13 last year.

Jason Aris, prosecuting, said both Norris and the victim had been out 'drinking heavily' at a party before they returned home which was when the attack took place.

Mr Aris described the victim's recollection of what happened as 'very patchy' but she could remember standing up in the kitchen with her back to the counter 'and the defendant having his hands around her neck'.

"She recollects trying to fight him off" said Mr Aris.

The complainant told police he would 'loosen his grip slightly but then do it again and say things like he was going to kill her'. Miss Smith also said the defendant said 'unpleasant things about her sister' and that, when she tried to leave, Norris dragged her back into the house.

Miss Smith also remembered him smashing her iPhone against a wall. "She remembers screaming and she recollects locking herself in the bathroom at one point" said Mr Aris.

While in the bathroom she saw an injury to her eye and her forehead as the defendant attempted to get in. Miss Smith, who was crying, also remembered that the defendant himself was crying at one point.

When she told him she needed to go to hospital she said this caused him to 'flip out' again. At one stage she told him she would tell medical staff she had sustained the injuries falling over.

The victim also described Norris sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor, crying and cutting himself on his arm with a knife as he swore and told her to 'go'.

She left the address at around 3am to walk to the hospital but a doorman, seeing her injuries, called an ambulance.

Police arrived in due course and she was taken to the QE where the 3cm cut over her eyebrow was stitched inside and out 'because the cut was so deep'.

Other injuries were inflicted, referred to as 'bruising all over her body', including to her arms, legs, upper back and buttocks and marks on her neck.

Robert Tolhurst, defending, said the overhead crane operator had accepted that alcohol had been the catalyst and had 'no desire to drink again'.

The relationship, he said, had been 'toxic' and one in which both 'very quickly became heavily invested'.

Judge Martin Jackson, sentencing, said the most likely cause of the laceration to her eyebrow was 'some sort of instrument with a sharp edge'. However, because the victim's recollection was so patchy he said he could not say whether it was 'with a knife, with a broken bottle or broken glass or something else'.

However, he accepted that there was a realistic prospect of rehabilitation, telling Norris: "You have taken positive steps to address your offending behaviour."

This included his guilty plea, moving out of Kidderminster to his new address with his aunt and cousin in Halesowen where he had obtained new employment and his abstention from alcohol.

Judge Jackson also bore in mind the conditions in prison during the Covid-19 pandemic which include inmates 'being locked up (in their cells) for up to 23 hours per day'.

Norris was sentenced to 21 months in prison suspended for two years and ordered to complete up to 35 rehabilitation activity requirement days.

The defendant, now of Park Lane, Halesowen, must also complete a nine month alcohol and abstinence monitoring requirement. He was ordered to pay £1,200 in compensation and £1,200 costs.

A restraining order was made for seven years in relation to the victim which prevents him attending her Kidderminster address or having any contact, directly or indirectly, with her. This includes via telephone, text or social media.

An offence of common assault against the same victim will be allowed to lie on file.