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A former champion boxer has been jailed for life for the murder of a man he killed with a single punch while working as a local hotel bouncer.
Gary Delaney, 35, ex-boyfriend of glamour girl Jodie Marsh, must spend at least 11 years behind bars after the attack on Paul Price, 23, at the County Hotel in Oak Hill, Woodford Green, last year.
The Old Bailey heard how Delaney hit Mr. Price with a ferocious upper-cut which knocked him to the ground with a ‘crack’, fracturing the back of his skull.
Mr. Price died five days after the incident on October 7.
The former Commonwealth light-heavyweight champion fought in 45 professional fights, of which he won 31 – 17 by knocking out his opponents.
Delaney, who went out with Ms. Marsh for four years before their spilt in 2000, was on duty at the hotel when he was asked to eject Mr. Price’s friend James Farrell.
While throwing 43-year-old Mr. Farrell out, Delaney sprayed him in the face with CS gas. Mr. Price then intervened and was hit with a single punch.
The court heard how the force from the heavily built bouncer’s punch lifted the 6ft 3in stockily built 15st man off his feet.
As Mr. Price lay on the floor, Delaney fled in his BMW car but was arrested later that night.
After a two-week trial, Delaney was found guilty of murder and brievious bodily harm.
Sentencing him, Judge Leonard Goldstone said: “It is often said that a bully is a coward. On that night you behaved like a bully, and when you knew that both of them were injured – at least one seriously – you reacted like a coward. You fist became a lethal weapon. Paul Price was no threat to you, or anyone else.”
Describing the fatal blow, Judge Goldstone added that Delaney’s “powerful fist” caused Mr. Price to “fall backwards and hit his head on the ground with what must have been a sickening thud”.
Delaney of Church Street, Stratford, was also given a nine month jail sentence for the assault on Mr. Farrell. It will run concurrently with the life sentence.
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