The actor Stephen Tompkinson has been found not guilty of inflicting grievous bodily harm by punching a drunk man who was making noise outside his house.
The DCI Banks lead actor had been accused of inflicting grievous bodily harm on Karl Poole on 30 May 2021.
Poole fell to the ground and broke his skull when his head hit the pavement, Newcastle crown court was told during the trial.
Prosecutors claimed Tompkinson “snapped” and “lashed out” at Poole in “disgust” at his behaviour. But Tompkinson told jurors he only pushed Poole away in self-defence and the contact “wasn’t enough to knock a sober man off his feet”.
On Thursday, a jury found him not guilty of causing grievous bodily harm after deliberating for just under two hours.
Tompkinson nodded but showed no visible emotion when the verdict was announced, while a sigh could be heard from the public gallery, where Poole was sitting.
Asked for his reaction outside court, Tompkinson told reporters: “I just want to go home.”
The trial was told Poole and his friend Andrew Hall had been drinking since midnight that bank holiday Sunday and had gone to the beach before passing Tompkinson’s home in Whitley Bay, North Tyneside, on the walk back.
Tompkinson, 57, who was living with his partner and her seven-year-old son at the time, heard “strange noises” at around 5.30am.
The actor called 999 after seeing the pair fall and try to stand up several times while drinking from a bottle of Jagermeister, jurors heard.
While waiting to be connected, Tompkinson went outside wearing pyjamas and a dressing gown and told the “heavily intoxicated” men who he was calling.
A neighbour, Caroline Davidson, who was watching from her bedroom window, told the court she saw Tompkinson slap and punch Poole, causing him to stumble and fall backwards, hitting his head on the ground.
Tompkinson said he could not have punched Poole because he was holding his phone.
He told the court the two men “took great objection to me complaining about them being there” and had started to move towards him. He said he put his hand out to stop Poole coming any further.
“I didn’t want to hurt him, I wanted to stop him, to change his mind about coming towards me and further on to my property.”
Tompkinson told the court he had lost acting work since being charged, and any association with him in the industry was “on hold” while the legal proceedings were hanging over him.
