Rioter sprayed police with fire extinguisher

A man who sprayed four police officers with a fire extinguisher at a hotel housing asylum seekers has been jailed for 20 months.

Steven Tiquin, 41, went to Potters International Hotel in Aldershot, Hampshire, on 3 August, three days after a violent mass protest, Salisbury Crown Court heard.

Finding no demonstrators there, he sprayed the officers, threw a bike, pulled an inspector's tie and challenged him to a fight, the court was told.

Tiquin previously pleaded guilty to four counts of assaulting emergency workers, a charge of affray and a racially aggravated public order offence.

More than 200 people shouted abuse, banged on windows and set off flares at the previous protest at the hotel on 31 July.

It was part of "rioting that swept England following the murders of three little girls in Southport", Judge Rufus Taylor told the court.

He said police were at the hotel making inquiries three days later when Tiquin arrived and "decided to make a statement".

The scaffolder, who had been drinking, shouted "they shouldn't be here" and "they're going to rape our children" as well as verbally abusing the officers, the judge said.

The defendant sprayed an inspector in the mouth, hit a constable and repeatedly tried to bite the officers after being pinned to the ground, the court heard.

Two of the officers suffered minor injuries, while children inside the hotel were "petrified", the judge said.

Barrister Lucy Conroy, defending, said the father of one was "exceptionally remorseful and embarrassed... by his own stupidity".

Tiquin, of Grosvenor Road, gave the judge a thumbs up when the sentence was read out.

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