Graduate jailed for knifing American football hopeful

A knife-wielding thug who maimed a promising American football player "for no apparent reason" has been jailed for 14 years.

William Ibironke, 24, repeatedly stabbed Jermaine Ford, 20, during a brawl outside the Temple Rooms
nightclub in Whitechapel on 17 May last year.

Mr Ford, who played for London Cobras in the British American Football League, has suffered permanent loss of movement in his left leg.

He has been forced to cancel several trials with top American teams.

Nigerian-born Ibironke also knifed sports-science student Matthew Keddo, 20, in the same attack.
Mr Keddo sustained multiple "catastrophic" long-term injuries, Snaresbrook crown court heard.

Ibironke, a graduate, denied attacking Mr Ford and Mr Keddo but was found guilty at Snaresbrook crown court after a trial in July.

Ibironke was called as back-up by his friend Babatunde Samuel, 24, who had been bottled by an unidentified reveller.

Samuel, of Hackney, received a 40-week jail term suspended for two years after being convicted of affray.

He will be electronically tagged, ordered to obey a night-time curfew and must complete 150 hours unpaid work.

Ibironke, of Bermondsey, was convicted of two counts of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and affray.