Former boxer gets life for "one punch" murder

LONDON, July 29 (Reuters) A former champion boxer was jailed for life for the ''cowardly'' murder of a man he killed with a single punch during a row at a party.

Garry Delaney (35) a bouncer from east London, must serve a minimum of 11 years in prison after being found guilty of murder at the Old Bailey.

Paul Price (23) was lifted off his feet by the force of the punch and hit his head on the ground, the court heard yesterday.

''Your fist became a lethal weapon,'' judge Leonard Goldstone told Delaney. ''Paul Price was no threat to you or anyone else.'' Trouble flared at a hotel disco in Essex last October when Price and a friend were refused entry because they were wearing trainers and jeans.

Delaney was asked by a member of staff at the County Hotel in Woodford to remove the pair. He picked up Price's friend and dumped him in some bushes.

Prosecutor Alan Suckling said Price confronted the bouncer, asking: ''Why did you do that?''.

The former boxer hit the victim with a ''powerful blow to the face, lifting him off his feet and striking the ground with a crack,'' Suckling said.

The judge rejected Delaney's defence that he had hit him with a ''half-hearted jab''.

''You behaved like a bully,'' judge Goldstone said. ''When you knew that both of them were injured - at least one seriously - you reacted like a coward.'' REUTERS SRS BST0522