A JURY has been sent out to consider whether a teenager intended to stab a man in his face during an alleyway altercation.

The 16-year-old from Basingstoke, who cannot be named due to legal reasons, left a man with a 6cm wound to his face, who he believed to be a grass.

The incident happened in an alleyway on January 12, this year, after the victim was returning from the One Stop, in Popley.

The teenager has already pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding and possessing a bladed article in a public place but faces a charge of wounding with intent.

Today a trial at Winchester Crown Court heard the closing speeches from the prosecution and defence counsels.

Prosecuting, Susan Cavender said that the defendant and the victim had fallen out after the victim “distanced himself”.

Ms Cavender said: “He (the defendant) had an issue with (the victim), he thought he was a grass, that issue came to ahead in such a way that he needed a confrontation.

“He told you he had information about where he could find (the victim).

“He told you that the information come from (another teenager) who rang him to tell him where (the victim) was.”

The jury was previously shown CCTV of the teenager running from his house, concealing a knife in his trousers.

“It was not a pocketknife, it is more like something in line with what Crocodile Dundee would recognise as a knife,” Ms Cavender said.

She continued: “If (the defendant) really wanted to confront (the victim) he could have done in that alleyway.

“What he couldn’t do from a safe distance was to stab (the victim) and that is what we say he was intent upon doing.”

She concluded: “To use that knife to slash at somebody is going to cause really serious harm and that (the defendant) knew that and that is why he set out with a knife as he did and cornered (the victim) in the alleyway.”

The court was told during the trial that the defendant allegedly lashed out three times at the victim, stabbing him on the third occasion.

But the defendant denies this and said it was an accident, with the victim’s face connecting with the knife during a tussle.

Defending, Audrey Archer said: “(The defendant), when he gave evidence to you provided you with a different set of circumstances as to how matters unfolded in the alleyway.

“He (the defendant) suggested that (the victim) is not right that he had a knife brandished from the outset [instead] that he was responsive about what (the victim) said and his actions.”

Ms Archer said the knife was pulled out only when the teenager “started to feel uncomfortable and threatened”.

She told the jury that in the victim’s evidence he said that the defendant was “mortified” about what happened, adding: “If that is right is that not indicative, in its very nature, [that] he did not anticipate the injury that (the victim) sustained.”

The jury was told that the defendant has carried a knife since he was young because “there is a big gang culture” in his area.

The jury is continuing its deliberation.