Beer mats drive home danger of '˜one punch' assaults in Chester-le-Street

Establishments in the town’s Pubwatch scheme will begin rolling out the new promotional messages in the coming weeks as part of the ongoing One Punch Can Kill campaign, spearheaded by Tony Curl and wife Maxine Thompson-Curl, whose son Kristian died after an assault in a nightclub in Consett.

Police and Crime Commissioner Ron Hogg said: “We all know what the consequences of excessive alcohol consumption can be, but only by talking to people who have suffered tragedies such as Maxine and Tony do you really appreciate how utterly devastating they are.

“The work that they have put in to raise this issue is truly inspiring.”

Neighbourhood inspector Paul Gray added: “We’ve worked hard over recent years to educate people on the dangers and consequences of getting into a fight on a night out and thankfully incidents of this nature are rare.”