Jail for Portsmouth man with '˜superhuman strength'

Witnesses said Matthew Moore appeared to have ‘superhuman strength’ when he launched the attacks at the Rudmore Roundabout in Portsmouth, last month.

In a bizarre incident, the 26-year-old punched and spat in unprovoked assaults after the traffic lights went red.

Victim Katherine Lewry told in her statement how Moore had come over to her car and spat at her son and hit her.

She said: ‘He punched me straight in the face. It wasn’t a hard punch, a glancing blow.’

Her statement added: ‘He started beating the passenger side really hard and got to the passenger door.

‘He seemed to have superhuman strength and started banging doors.

‘I’ve never had anything like this happen to me before.’

A PCSO who came to help was spat at.

‘She says she was also spat at in the face and it was the first time she was assaulted in the street,’ Mr Heath said.

He added: ‘He’s gone on targeting motorists for no good reason. There’s no dispute, the parties aren’t known to each other, they just happened to be in the area where the defendant was.’

The court heard the incident started when the traffic lights close to the ferry port turned to red, and Moore punched a car window.

Moore, of Sparrow Close, Waterlooville, was jailed for 110 days at Portsmouth Magistrates’ Court after admitting breaching previous suspended sentences and a conditional discharge.

He repeatedly interrupted magistrates saying: ‘I’ve got no recognition of it, send me to jail.’

Sentencing, chair of the bench John Henley said the it was a ‘very nasty’ unprovoked incident.

He added: ‘Spitting is one of the nastiest forms of assault anybody can receive, and we know police officers in particular hate being spat at. We’re told police officers prefer being hit.’

Bill Charlton, for Moore, said: ‘We can’t contest anything the crown has said, largely because we can’t remember what happened because we were so intoxicated at the time.’

He added Moore was drinking while on medication.

The incident happened at about 11pm on July 9 and Moore could not be interviewed until about 2pm the next day.

Moore pleaded guilty to two counts of criminal damage to a Honda Civic and a BMW, two counts of assault by beating on Katherine Lewry and Jack Cowlishaw, assault on a PCSO in the execution of her duty and using threatening or abusive words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress. His previous suspended sentences were for two criminal damage offences, two counts of assaulting a police officer, obstructing a police officer and a further three counts of assaulting a police officer.