A SOLDIER has been spared jail for a nightclub attack after a judge heard how his war zone experiences left him with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Jonathen McSporran smashed a glass in the face of former classmate Aaron Caplin after asking him for a fight in the Aruba club, in Redcar, east Cleveland, in February.

McSporran, 20, was told yesterday that he would have been jailed for two years had it not been for the psychological damage that a tour of Afghanistan had caused him.

Instead, the judge, Recorder Jonathan Sandiford, imposed a nine-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, and ordered him to pay £1,200 compensation.

Teesside Crown Court heard McSporran had never before been in trouble, and that his parents told how his service in Afghanistan had left him a changed man.

Peter Wishlade, mitigating, told Mr Recorder Sandiford that before the tour of duty, McSporran had savings of £6,000 and had no history of drinking or trouble.

Since his return, he has run up £15,000 debt, started drinking heavily and has been assessed by a clinical psychologist as suffering from the disorder.

Because he was spared prison, the Green Howard will keep his job and will next week start a course of treatment at his base at Catterick Garrison.

Mr Wishlade said: “He has seen things that most 20-yearolds should not have to see. He is devastated and ashamed of what he did in the nightclub that night.”

The court heard McSporran wrongly suspected Mr Caplin of staring at him in the nightclub and challenged him to a fight on the dance floor.

After feeling a hand on his shoulder, Mr Caplin was unable to hear what McSporran was saying, so he turned away.

He was then struck in the face with the bottle.

Jolyon Perks, prosecuting, said the victim was taken to hospital and had cuts to his eyelid and cheek stitched.

Mr Wishlade said: “It was an over-reaction at a particular time to a perceived threat that probably didn’t exist, but he has been in a war zone where one does not know whose one enemy is, and that increases tension and fear.”

McSporran, of Coatham Road, Redcar, who admitted unlawful wounding, was told by the judge: “I am prepared to take a wholly exceptional course in your case.”