SCOTLAND striker Oli McBurnie has been found not guilty of a single charge of assault by beating.
The footballer had been accused of assaulting a pitch invader during his side’s game against Nottingham Forest last season.
District Judge Leo Pyle said his judgment was based on evidence heard in the court and “not the instant judgment of social media”.
In his ruling, the judge said some of the evidence given by alleged victim George Brinkley had been “somewhat flimsy”.
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Judge Pyle had been urged by McBurnie’s barrister to find that “a degree of club bias” was responsible for the accounts given by witnesses to the incident.
During her closing speech, McBurnie’s barrister Lisa Judge said the footballer had lifted his boot “like a ballerina” to clear the legs of the complainant, who was “lying on the floor of a pitch he ought not to have been on”.
Clearing McBurnie, District Judge Pyle said of mobile phone footage of the alleged attack: “The defendant’s foot is nowhere near Mr Brinkley’s left shin. He (McBurnie) quickly and clearly lifts his leg up to avoid the complainant.”
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