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 Billy Leeson |
‘Why I can’t forgive my attacker’ – Billy
Musician reveals trauma of punch that nearly killed him
MUSICIAN Billy Leeson says he cannot forgive the man who left him in a three-week coma after a brutal street attack.
Mr Leeson, 19, from Brecknock Road, Kentish Town, was left fighting for his life after being punched by peace activist Christiaan Briggs in Camden Road, Holloway, in June.
Briggs was jailed for eight months at Snaresbrook Crown Court on Monday (see page 11).
Mr Leeson (pictured) told the New Journal: “The day of the sentence was exactly four months since the attack and I’m just about getting better now. I’m still angry and I’m not ever going to be able to forgive what he did to me, my family and friends.
“I was dead for two minutes as I lay there and the attack has messed up my career, which finished because I was away for so long.
“I’m really pleased with the sentence because everyone expected him to just get community service. It’s an exchange for taking away four months of our lives.”
Mr Leeson blames Briggs for the split-up of his band, Les Incompétents. Briggs floored Mr Leeson with one punch, smashing his head onto the kerb. It happened after the singer took exception to the New Zealander eyeing up his girlfriend, Elli Bradshaw.
Mr Leeson said: “I’ve been in little fights before but this wasn’t a provoked attack. It was out of the blue and that is unforgivable. I’ve been punched before but he just hit me so square I was knocked out. However much he says he didn’t mean to hurt me, he knows what he was doing.”
Billy’s mother Helena said of her son’s attacker: “He’s supposed to be this pacifist but he’s got a lot of repressed aggression and this obviously all just came out.”
Mr Leeson remembers nothing of the attack and little about his first month in the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead.
He said: “From what I was told, I was quite vicious to the nurses because I thought I was being tortured. I woke up in a room in intensive care with all these tubes coming out of my body.”
Mr Leeson is awaiting a date for a final operation, which could leave him with a titanium plate permanently in his skull.
Mr Leeson’s mother said: “Bill’s getting better but the last time he had the skull operation, his faced swelled up like he’d done 10 rounds with Muhammad Ali.”
He has a soft patch on the top of his head with just skin and hair and no bone.
Les Incompétents will play a farewell gig at the 100 Club in Oxford Street next month. Tickets have already sold out.
Mr Leeson said: “It will be emotional. We had a deal to record an album in Latvia and might have split up anyway, but it would have been on our terms.”
The teenager paid tribute to Ms Bradshaw, his girlfriend of four years.
She has never been far from his side over the past four months.
Mr Leeson is already busy managing new bands and hopes to start up a fresh group in the new year.
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