GAZETTE & HERALD: A mass brawl outside a pub in Box has left Morry Jones facing the prospect of a prison term.

The 28-year-old is accused of wading into the fight which had spilled on to the A4, and using a cosh to viciously hit a man over the head.

Although he accepts he hit a man over the head, Jones claims he found the weapon lying in the road.

A judge at Swindon Crown Court heard how the incident spilled over because of tensions in the village over workers from the north of England who stay in a pub.

The court was told the landlord of the Queens Head ran a business selling door to door products in the area and had men from the north west of England who worked for him.

Ramon Pakrooh, defending, said that their presence had caused tensions in the community.

He said that they had been blamed by some people for a rise in burglaries and were regarded as 'bullies and unpleasant people', by many locals.

Earlier the court heard how the brawl started on the evening of Wednesday, September 1 last year.

Kirsty Real, prosecuting, said victim David Skinner had been staying at the Queens Head along with other members of his sales team.

Late in the evening she said they went to the Co-op store in the village to buy food and passed a group of five or six locals outside the shop and a fight broke out.

Mr Skinner suffered a two inch laceration to the side of his head which require five staples at hospital.

In the early hours of the following morning she said Jones called the police to say he had hit the man and was later questioned.

The court heard that he had a string of previous convictions including possessing an offensive weapon and in 1999 he received a four-and-a-half year jail term for robbery.

Jones, of Long Acre, London Road, admitted actual bodily harm at a previous hearing.

Mr Pakrooh told the court that his client now accepted that he had used a cosh, after originally claiming he had hit the victim with a bottle, but said he had found it in the road and insisted it was not his.

"He was helping his friend Nathan. People were on his back and Mr Jones got involved but he accepts he went too far," he said.

Recorder Ian Glen QC decided that he needs to hear evidence before sentence could be passed.

He told Mr Pakrooh "If it is right that he has an extendible cosh and once the fighting dies down he hit a man on the head he deserves a very substantial sentence. And if you are right, then he doesn't."

The case was adjourned for a trial date to be fixed.