A FIFE man who was involved in what police at the time described as a “vicious” attack on a pensioner in his own home has been sentenced to nine months’ detention at Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court.

Sean Barker (17), of McDuff Street, East Wemyss, admitted, while acting with others, assaulting a 69-year-old man by punching and kicking him on the head and body to his injury on November 19, 2005.

The court heard the man had been asleep in the early hours before a group of men forced entry into his home in Main Avenue and attacked him.

Barker’s defence solicitor said her client had been 16 years old at the time of the offence and always accepted his guilt but stressed he had not instigated the assault and had only assisted in holding the man down.

The solicitor asked Sheriff Braid to give Barker a chance to show it had been a “rather foolish but one-off” incident and he was no longer associated with the people involved.

However, Sheriff Braid told him, “I accept that there are significant mitigating circumstances…However, the assault was committed in the early hours of the morning and the object was to get the complainer out of East Wemyss.

“You do have to accept the consequences of your actions.”

Another accused, Steven Parker (17), of Alexander Street, East Wemyss, pled guilty to a lesser charge of theft of items from the man’s home which included a fishing rod, binoculars and a tripod.

He was sentenced to nine months’ probation and placed on a four-month restriction of liberty order which means he cannot leave his home between 7pm and 7am daily.