A 23-year-old man with a substantial alcohol abuse problem has been given a two-year probation order for an attack outside the Swizzle Inn.

Isaac Robert Lambe, of Red Coat Lane, St. George’s, punched 51-year-old Winfield Simpson twice in the face and stole his wallet from his back pocket as he lay on the ground in the early hours of September 9, 2005.

He told Supreme Court yesterday: “I’m remorseful for what happened. I was intoxicated and I used poor judgement. I’m not known as a violent person at all and this was a bad night I guess.”

Prosecutor Cindy Clarke said Mr. Simpson met Lambe, who has no previous convictions in Bermuda, at a staff party at the Hamilton parish pub and restaurant and recognised him as a distant relative. “He tried to tell the defendant that he knew his father but the defendant did not want to hear from him,” she said.

Mr. Simpson later saw the defendant on a motorcycle outside and asked him about his father again. “Mr. Simpson kept saying to him he was Derek Lambe’s son,” said Ms Clarke. “The defendant asked Mr. Simpson if he wanted to fight and Mr. Simpson approached the defendant.

“The defendant then punched Mr. Simpson twice in the face, causing him to fall to the ground in a semi-conscious state.” She said he took the wallet and used the $2 inside to buy gas for his bike.

His victim was treated at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital for a bruised right eye and grazed cheek. Lambe’s father handed the wallet in to Police the next day and the defendant was arrested later that month. He admitted assault causing bodily harm and theft.

Puisne Judge Charles-Etta Simmons told him: “It’s very clear that there is a substantial abuse problem here. It appears to be alcohol.”

She placed him under a night-time curfew for the first six months of the probation order and said he needed to discuss his living arrangements with his probation officer because “your father drinks as well, doesn’t he?”