A TOP racehorse trainer has been fined £4,500 for a ‘truly shocking and violent’ incident with a female employee at his yard.
Liam Bailey’s attack was recorded by the victim on her phone and the pair ended up in a ‘wrestling match’ on the floor.
The trainer screamed ‘I don’t give a f***! I don’t give a f***!’ as he lunged at her, throwing a wheelbarrow aside to confront her after she was late for work.
The woman – who was left with bruising on her arm – fled the scene before being chased by Bailey.
He then tried to make light of the whole thing before the woman reported the incident, which took place in October 2019, to police.
Delivering his verdict on Thursday, David Fish QC told Bailey: “This was a truly shocking incident involving appalling language, violent and threatening behaviour on your part, culminating in you grabbing the young lady by her arm in an effort to obtain a mobile phone, which you must have known was filming your behaviour.
“The footage which we have seen, each member of the panel has found to be very disturbing indeed and it paints you on this occasion in a very bad and poor light indeed.
“This was done in the confines of a stable in which a racehorse was present and that could have had terrible consequences, had that racehorse reacted in the wrong way.”
Bailey said the woman, who now works at another yard, was repeatedly late for work but admitted: “I still shouldn’t have acted how I did, I accept that.”
A disciplinary panel was shown the victim’s footage.
She said she was late to evening stables after having ‘car trouble’.
Video captured the moment Bailey confronted her in the stable, shouting: “You were late, you were f***ing late.
“Get it into your head. You were late! It don’t have to be anybody else’s fault if you were late!
The staffer replied: “If you ever try and hit me…”
It was after this that Bailey launched the wheelbarrow aside and advanced towards her, shouting: “I don’t give a f***! I don’t give a f***!”
The footage ended as he went for her phone.
‘WRESTLING MATCH’
Charlotte Davison, representing the BHA, said the pair ‘somehow ended up on the floor’ in a ‘wrestling match’.
Bailey, who is based in Middleham, North Yorkshire, said: “It had been a build-up of things. I should have been more professional and just nipped it in the bud.
“When I look at the staff I have now, they’re exemplary, they’re unbelievable, they’re fantastic. And then when I look back, it was unbelievable, really.
“But then, my first season training, we were struggling, she knew we were short of staff, there was no way we could afford to lose her.
“It was an attitude that, ‘I’ll do what I want and there’s nothing really you can do about it’.
“I still shouldn’t have done what I did, I shouldn’t have gone to grab the phone, I shouldn’t have shouted at her. Obviously, the footage misses the bit where she’s shouting at me.”
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