A convicted football hooligan has been sentenced to two years and eight months in prison after an Islington pub attack on Guardian columnist Owen Jones.

Mr Jones suffered cuts and swelling to his back and head, and bruises all down his body in the incident outside the Lexington pub on Pentonville Road on August 17 last year.

At Snaresbrook Crown Court on July 24, James Healy, 40, from Portsmouth, was given a two-year, eight-month prison sentence for affray and assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

His two co-defendants - Liam Tracey, 35, from Camden and Charlie Ambrose, 30, from Brighton - were given suspended sentences of eight months each, suspended for two years after pleading guilty to affray.

After a two-day hearing to determine Healy’s motive, Judge Anne Studd QC previously found the unprovoked attack could only be motivated by Mr Jones’s media profile as a left-wing polemicist.

In his evidence, Mr Jones said: “I’m an unapologetic socialist, I’m an anti-racist, I’m an anti-fascist and I’ve consistently used my profile to advocate left-wing causes.”