A cycle rage thug who chased a 72-year-old on his bike before brutally assaulting him in a row over right of way on the road was today jailed for two-and-a-half years.
Graeme Brankin followed Keith Walker from Dundee city centre for around a mile before hitting him so hard that his eye socket and cheekbone were fractured.
A jury was told that an argument had erupted between Brankin and the OAP over right of way in the city’s High Street.
The pensioner was cycling when he heard shouting from behind him with Brankin – who went on to carry out an almost identical attack 11 months later – calling him “blind” and “stupid”.
Mr Walker cycled off but later sensed someone behind him.
After another argument Brankin struck the pensioner so hard his glasses and hearing aid fell off and his legs buckled, causing him to fall from his bicycle.
A jury at Dundee Sheriff Court heard the man needed an operation to insert three metal plates into his faces a result of the attack.
Meanwhile callous Brankin – who has a string of previous convictions for violence – simply cycled off.
A three-day trial heard from another victim of an almost identical attack elsewhere in the city, which took place 11 months later.
In that second cycle rage attack, Alistair Bruce told how he had been hit by Brankin in a park and woke up later in Ninewells Hospital.
Another witness said “super angry” Brankin screamed at the man, before resting his bike against a wall and punching him in the face.
As Mr Bruce fell to the ground, Brankin – a father of four – struck him twice again before once again cycling off.
The witness said he was concerned for Mr Bruce, who was covered in blood, and put him in the recovery position fearing he would choke.
Brankin, 49, a prisoner at HMP Perth, had denied charges of assault to severe injury and assault to injury.
But a jury took less than half an hour to find him unanimously guilty of both attacks.
He was convicted of assaulting the pensioner by repeatedly striking him on the head, causing him to fall from his bicycle to the ground, to his severe injury between Greenmarket and Roseangle on September 2, 2013.
And Brankin was also found guilty of assaulting another male by repeatedly punching him on the head, knocking him to the ground, rendering him unconscious to his injury at the pavement entrance to Claypotts Park, Arbroath Road on August 9 last year.
Larry Flynn, defending, said: “He has been undergoing anger management courses in prison and is aware that these are matters that he requires to address.
“He accepts he didn’t deal with matters as he should have.”
Sheriff George Way jailed Brankin for a total of 30 months, and imposed a 12-month supervised release order meaning he will be monitored when he gets out of jail.
He said: “You say it wasn’t you that carried out the offences against Mr Walker – but the jury found you guilty.
“It was a very serious assault on an elderly man which had very serious consequences.
“A custodial sentence is justly merited.”
