A KNIFE-wielding thug left a man who refused to fight him scarred after slashing his face during a confrontation near Carlisle city centre.

Ricky Murphy, 26, was riding an electric scooter when he caught up with his victim outside the city’s railway station, where he told the man: “I’ve got a blade with me – and I want you to come down this lane for a fight.”

It was shortly after this, as the victim struggled to defend himself, that Murphy slashed the man's face, opening up a 7cm long wound. Murphy, of Raven Nook, Carlisle, had earlier admitted unalwful wounding.

Denise Fitzpatrick, prosecuting, said the attack happened shortly before 11am on Monday, February 21 when Murphy spotted the man walking towards the city centre.

Noticing the defendant, and not wanting to speak to him, the man quickly changed his intended route to avoid him.

The two men had fallen out in December, 2020, when an associate of the victim tried to steal drugs from the defendant, the court heard. Yet Murphy seemed to blame the man he was about to attack. 

Catching up with the man, Murphy asked the man for fight, and then began punching his head, using both fists.  Initially the man froze, said Miss Kirkpatrick. “Then he tried to protect his head with his arms,” said the barrister.

“Ricky Murphy struck him to the head a few times but then [the victim] started to defend himself, taking hold of Ricky Murphy in a headlock with his left arm. He didn’t want to fight Ricky Murphy.

“And he was frightened of what he had said about having a blade.” The man was yelling: “Just leave it!”

During the struggle, Murphy reached to his waistband to grab his short-bladed knife and then used it to slash the victim’s face, opening up his lower lip. 

After this, Murphy told him: “If I see you on the street, I’m going to do this again but it will be ten times worse.”

Murphy was last seen fleeing along English Street. The victim was treated at the city’s Cumberland Infirmary where his wound was closed under local anaesthetic.

Though he was expected to fully recover, he was left scarred.

In an impact statement, the victim said what happened left him so frightened that he had decided to leave Carlisle, where his family live. While living here, he was reluctant to go out, fearing he would be hurt again.

In a second statement, made in August, he said he had difficulty sleeping and was suffering from depression.

The court heard that Murphy’s criminal record comprised of 32 offences, including two previous assaults.

One was on his father.

Kim Whittlestone, defending, said that the wounding was Murphy’s first offence of 'real violence' and in the past he resorted to violence to protect his mother.

Of the knife attack, the barrister said: “He hadn’t gone out looking for him.

“There was a confrontation, and he accepts that the lost his temper.

"I ask the court to bear in mind that this was first real offence of violence; that this is a young man… and the court should bear in mind what the Probation Service has said about him: that they feel he can be rehabilitated.”

In prison, Murphy had become a mentor for other prisoners, she added.

Recorder Andrew McLoughlin jailed Murphy for 28 months. He also imposed a five-year restraining order, banning the defendant from having any contact with the victim for that period.