A KNIFE collector who stabbed a complete stranger in the street has been jailed for two and a half years.

Alcohol-fuelled Stephen McCormack from the Broadway, Northbourne, admitted wounding Samuel Jordan and possessing an offensive weapon.

Prosecuting yesterday at Bournemouth Crown Court, Simon Jones said violence had flared on May 9 this year as Mr Jordan, from Bradford Upon Avon, was walking back from Kinson Conservative Club to his relatives’ home.

He was approached by McCormack who had been beaten up earlier in the evening and mistakenly believed Mr Jordan was responsible.

Mr Jones added: “Mr McCormack swung a punch at Mr Jordan which he managed to block before realising that the defendant was carrying a sheath knife with a six-to-eight-inch curved blade.”

The court heard how McCormack had started “swinging the knife wildly” at Mr Jordan at the entrance to Keeble Road.

Mr Jones said: “Mr Jordan realised he had an open slash wound, blood was pouring from his nose and he collapsed on the floor.”

He was taken to hospital where he received stitches to a 15cm neck wound as well as nose and finger injuries. Later he was referred for plastic surgery and needed three months off work.

McCormack told police he had downed eight or nine pints of lager that evening and been a knife collector from childhood.

In McCormack’s defence, Iain Ross said: “He stupidly went out, having been attacked himself.

“He was extremely drunk and knows he shouldn’t have gone back out with a knife.

“He was fired up by what had happened to him – Mr Jordan was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Sentencing McCormack, Judge Samuel Wiggs told him: “You know how concerned the public is about knife crime.

“Mr Jordan was minding his own business on a night out.

“You thought, quite wrongly, that he had been involved in an attack upon you.

“Your attack was quite unjustified. You cannot take the law into your own hands, particularly when you get it wrong.

“You could very, very easily have killed him.”