Hornchurch football thug jailed for his part in bloody brawl

A Hornchurch man involved in a pre-arranged “pitched battle” between football hooligans has been jailed for eight months.

Andrew Hudson, 26, of Tennyson Way, was a key player in the bloody brawl between Brentford and Leyton Orient supporters outside Liverpool Street station in central London in May last year.

Judge Timothy Pontius said the men had taken part in a “disgraceful display of violence” that terrified ordinary people using a busy railway station and put them at risk of harm from bottles thrown across the street.

He said the “pitched battle” must have been a “frightening spectacle” that required a “firm deterrent message” from the court.

Prominent English Defence League member Joel Titus, 19, from north-west London was also jailed for nine months, for his part.

Titus was captured on CCTV hurling objects at rivals and fighting over a wooden pole with another thug.

He had previously been cautioned for battery after punching a journalist at a right-wing demonstration against the “Islamification of Europe” in December 2009, the Old Bailey heard.

He is reported to be a youth organiser for the EDL and has appeared on the BBC Newsnight programme talking about his role in protests.

Dean Wells, 22, of Isleworth, west London, was jailed for 12 months, while David Mitchell, 19, of Littlehampton, West Sussex, was given seven months.

Steven Donovan, 20, of Hayes, Middlesex, and Thomas Armstrong, 24, of Woodford Green, Essex, were each given suspended six-month sentences.

The six men admitted a charge of affray at earlier hearings.