A MAN who smashed a bottle of spirits over the head of a supermarket worker, then punched his ex-girlfriend in the mouth when she said she was leaving him, won his fight to get an Anti-Social Behaviour Order imposed on him lifted.

Appeal Court judges ruled that the ASBO was unlawful.

James Samuel Dickinson, aged 27, of Laycock Avenue, Tonge Moor, Bolton, had 'scant regard for the law,' London's Criminal Appeal court heard.

He had been jailed for 15 months on November 7 after pleading guilty at Bolton Crown Court to theft and two counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm .

That sentence still stands, but Mr Justice Lloyd Jones and Judge Findlay Baker quashed the ASBO imposed on the same date, after ruling that it had been put in place wrongfully as an extra punishment, rather than to protect the public.

Mr Justice Lloyd Jones said Dickinson hit a supermarket guard with a bottle after his attempts at shoplifting were foiled.

He was bailed for this offence only to go wild and attack his girlfriend when she told him she was leaving and ignored his pleas for her to stay.

The judge said:"The purpose of an ASBO is not to punish the offender but to protect others. The imposition of this ASBO was to punish the offender and it is therefore unlawful," said the judge.