A MAN who was found by a jury to have committed five assaults against emergency workers will be detained in a secure hospital.

Judge Nicholas Cole said after the case the circumstances of the mental health of defendant Nathan Bagley would not mean what the emergency workers went through, being spat at and assaulted, would “have been any less unpleasant”.

The short jury trial - the first held at courtroom three of Worcester Crown Court since lockdown - took less than four hours in total with the jury taking just 20 minutes to reach their verdicts.

At the start of the trial Judge Cole explained to the jury that Bagley had been found unfit to plead or stand trial, and was not in court. He explained they were tasked with determining only if the acts had been committed.

Mark Cooper, a prison custody officer, told the court Bagley, after being sentenced at Kidderminster Magistrates Court on June 10 last yearshook the glass in the dock.

“He turned and spat into my face,” Mr Cooper said. Michael Cooper, another prison custody officer, said he was alerted to the scuffle after the panic alarm was pressed.

“As I opened the door, he spat in my face,” Michael Cooper said.

Police Sergeant Julie Watson then gave evidence and said, after speaking to Bagley outside Costa Coffee in Hereford and holding her arm out to help him up from where he had been sleeping, he “lashed out and made contact with the palm of my hand”. She added he swore at her during the incident on June 29 last year.

Police Constable John Gilbert then gave evidence that when Bagley was brought to Hereford Police Station later that day, he avoided two spits in his direction, before a third spit later in a cell went on “the right side of my cheek”.

And Detective Constable Nigel Cleeton, of Herefordshire CID said on June 30, when Bagley was brought up from his cell for fingerprints and a custody picture, he was spat at by the 33-year-old.

The jury returned unanimous verdicts that Bagley, formerly of Friars Street, Hereford, had committed the five acts, and Judge Cole said he was given a hospital order, meaning he will be detained under the Mental Health Act at Reaside Clinic in Rubery.