‘Clockwork Orange’ attack led to death of ‘witty’ civil servant Ian Baynham - Ruby Thomas and Joel Alexander guilty of manslaughter
Published: 17 December 2010
by DAVID ST GEORGE
A DRUNKEN teenage blonde who killed a stranger in a “Clockwork Orange-style” attack had been sentenced earlier for beating up an Asian bus driver, it was revealed for the first time yesterday (Thursday).
Jobless Ruby Thomas stamped on “openly gay” civil servant Ian Baynham after calling him and a friend “f…… faggots” as they walked through Trafalgar Square.
When Mr Baynham, 62, remonstrated about the mindless homophobic abuse he was felled by a punch from sports student
Joel Alexander, accompanying Thomas and her friend Rachel Burke on a night out.
The Old Bailey heard that Mr Baynham, from Beckenham, had been celebrating getting a new job on the day he was left sprawled on the pavement outside South Africa House on September 25 2009.
He suffered severe brain damage and skull fractures and died in hospital 18 days later.
“Eyewitnesses were shocked by the viciousness unleashed and one onlooker likened the level of violence to a scene
from the cult film A Clockwork Orange,” said prosecutor Brian Altman QC.
Thomas, now 19, from Lichfield Staffordshire, and Alexander, 20, of Thornton Heath, were convicted of manslaughter. Burke, 18, of Three Oaks, East Sussex, was cleared on that earlier charge but convicted of affray.
Judge Richard Hawkins QC will sentence all three next month.
In January 2008 Thomas was given a nine-month community punishment order for assault and carrying a bladed article. She was with a gang of drunken girls who attacked the driver on a night bus when he parked near Trafalgar Square.
Thomas spat at him and punched him on the head and kicked him. She blamed drink and was treated leniently by the court as it was her first offence.
Some of Mr Baynham’s family members were in court for the guilty verdicts. In an impact statement – his mother is in her 90s and is still trying to cope with the loss – Mr Baynham, a keen angler, was described as “witty and eloquent”.