Teenager 'lucky' not to be jailed after filming vicious Leeds street attack on his phone

Seventeen at the time, he recorded the assault involving two teenagers attacking a third on Holtdale Approach in Adel.

Ryan Wheeler could then be heard on the film encouraging the pair to attack the stricken boy on the afternoon of December 12 last year.

With Wheeler having turned 18 since then, it meant he appeared for sentence this week as an adult at Leeds Crown Court.

Prosecutor Michael Smith said Wheeler was with the two other boys when they came across the victim, who was a former friend with whom they had fallen out with.

After one of the boys knocked food out of the victim’s hands, they then began attacking him and giving him verbal abuse.

They kicked, punched and spat at him, before they tried to rob him of money as Wheeler filmed and shouted encouragement.

It only came to an end when a passer-by intervened and asked if the boy was okay.

He was not badly injured but was upset and shaken, Mr Smith said.

Wheeler, of Holtdale Avenue, Adel, was arrested two days later and during his police interview admitted being present and recording the incident, but denied taking part in the violence.

With no previous convictions, the part-time window cleaner admitted a charge of affray.

Mitigating, Allan Armbrister said Wheeler admitted and regretted his actions.

He said: “What he did was film, as youngsters do, an unpleasant event that encouraged others and because of that, he was equally responsible.”

Judge Simon Phillips KC gave him an 18-month community order with 60 hours of unpaid work and told him to pay £200 costs.

He warned him: “It was a cowardly and unpleasant attack, he was punched, kicked and spat at.

"You filmed part of it and encouraged the others. If you had been an adult then the starting point would have been a custodial sentence.”

The other two boys, who cannot be named for legal reasons, were dealt with by the youth court where they admitted robbery and were given referral orders.