A SAVAGE thug headbutted a vulnerable elderly man unconscious as he tried to help his partner.

James Dundon has been jailed for four years for knocking out the pensioner in Pitsea as well as carrying out a knifepoint robbery on a 14-year-old boy within three months.

The 19-year-old had been having a row with his then girlfriend and her friend in Tyrrell Court at 11pm on May 30 last year.

The row had gone on for 30 minutes, resulting in Dundon’s victim, an elderly man with arthritis who walks with a stick, to go outside his flat and try to help.

The man went to Dundon’s girlfriend and advised her to go back to her own flat. However, Dundon reappeared, walked straight up to the man and headbutted him so hard he was knocked to the floor and fell unconscious.

When he came to the man was being cared for by the two women, with Dundon making threats of “leaving him for dead”, before calming down and apologising to the man, saying he “didn’t normally do these things”.

The man was taken to hospital where he suffered swelling to his chin and cuts to his lip, and now fears for his safety in his own home.

The robbery took place at 5.45pm on Wednesday August 14 when Dundon threatened a 14-year-old boy with a knife in Vernons Walk before taking his bank card, PIN number and wallet.

He later withdrawing £20 from a cash point. He was arrested the next day.

Dundon, of Wickford Avenue, Basildon, was later convicted of the robbery and admitted causing grievous bodily harm, appearing at Chelmsford Crown Court on Tuesday for sentencing.

Mitigating, Isobel McCarroll said Dundon had not realised his GBH victim was so vulnerable and would not have considered attacking him had he known.

She said: “He now realises in the cold light of day he was a vulnerable gentleman and he is deeply, deeply ashamed of his actions.

“Whilst in prison he has fully completed an inmate anger management workshop.”

Sentencing, Judge Andrew Hurst said Dundon had “a lot of growing up to do”.

He said: “You had no other regard for following anything but your own agenda of violence.

“You do not care for anything but your own needs and self-gratification.”

Dundon was given 12 months detention for causing GBH and three years detention for robbery, totalling four years behind bars.