Kettering Nando’s worker, waving meat cleaver at customer, walks free | UK News

A Nando’s worker who threatened a customer with a meat cleaver was spared jail time.

Lewis Tassell, 20, was arrested after retrieving the blade from the kitchen before waving it around in the air in front of customers in May last year.

He had been working when someone he knew from school asked to speak to him, mistakenly believing his partner was cheating on him with the Nando’s worker.

Prosecutor Shabbir Issat said the “situation escalated” when the couple started talking.

Mr Issat said: “He walked over to the grill, picked up a meat cleaver, lifted it and pointed it at him.”

A court heard another employee was able to safely take the knife before Tassell was arrested and lost his job at the Kettering, Northamptonshire, branch.

Tassell, from the village of Burton Latimer, near the East Midlands city, later left the restaurant and was found with cannabis when arrested by police.

He admitted threatening someone with a sharp object and possession of cannabis when he appeared in Northampton Magistrates’ Court.

Tassell was sentenced to a 12-month community decree with 10 days of rehabilitation and 80 hours of unpaid labor.

He was also ordered to pay £85 in costs and a £114 victim surcharge last Wednesday.

Tassell asked that the judges be contacted to apologize for his behavior.

He said: “I’m sorry. That’s not me. I accept everything you will give me.

‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. I’ve played. I’m sorry.’

The bank’s chair, Suzanne Gibbard, replied: “Don’t worry, it won’t be bad and you’ll go home.

“You’re 20 years old and sometimes you do things without thinking. That was clearly the case – we can see that from the video surveillance.

“But there are consequences to actions and at this young age you will learn that.”

Ben Brown, defending himself, said Tassell was initially calm and it only escalated when the victim allegedly threatened his family and told him “he knew where they lived”.

He said Tassell then picked up the blade and told him to get out, holding the gun in his hand for about three seconds.

Mr Brown added that the incident was atypical.

He said: “He’s very remorseful about what happened… he’s just not that kind of boy.”

Tassell faced a ban behind bars, but Mr Brown added it would be “unfair” to send him to jail.

He said, ‘He wants to put this behind him.’

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