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A thug with an “appalling history of serious violence” has narrowly avoided jail after charging at a pensioner, knocking him flying.

Habitual offender, David O’Connell, who has 69 offences against his name, was drunk when he targeted stranger Alan Limbrick at Rochester Railway Station on May 6, last year.

The 37-year-old’s entirely unprovoked attack on Mr Limbrick saw him never return to Medway, where he was visiting with a view to moving back to the area.

A court heard the pensioner was left with severe bruising after the shocking incident, and three weeks after the attack, he was still suffering from pain.

And when police arrested O’Connell over the incident he then spat at PC Paul Wooster at Medway Police Station in Gillingham.

O’Connell, of Quarry Road, Maidstone, was cha

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