Two brothers have been acquitted of an assault using scaffolding poles after a jury agreed they had acted in self-defence.

Video footage shown to the jury at the Court of General Gaol Delivery showed Reece Thompson, 28, swinging a scaffold pole into the leg of man during a street fight on Demesne Road, Douglas.

He and his young brother Lewis, 27, had grabbed poles from a lorry parked outside their mother’s home, the latter hitting the man on his shoulder before his older sibling ran round to strike to the upper leg.

Reece Thompson, of Hazel Crescent, Pulrose, and Lewis Thompson of Farvane Park, Douglas, denied a joint charge of affray and also a count of possession of an offensive weapon.

The seven-strong jury delivered a unanimous not guilty verdict to all charges on the third day of the trial. Acting Deemster Parkes KC thanked the jurors for their ‘close and careful attention to the case’.

Giving evidence at their trial this week, the brothers insisted they had acted in self-defence fearing they were to be assaulted by their mother’s partner Brian Wootton who had armed himself with a wheel brace.

Mr Wootton, 45, of Demesne Road, has pleaded guilty to affray and possession of an offensive weapon and is due to be sentenced at a date to be fixed.

Young brother Lewis, who is just 5ft 3ins tall, said he feared they were going to be attacked by the much bigger man. ‘He looked possessed,’ he told the jury.

Reece told the court: ‘I just wanted to scare him away. I was scared for me and my brother’s life.’

The court heard qualified joiner Lewis had gone round to his mother’s home on August 28 last year and found his older brother sitting outside.

He said Reece told him ‘they are arguing again’ and a minute later Mr Wootton came down in a rush and told them he had just smashed up their mum’s flat.

The man left and subsequently pulled up in his car and started screaming at the brothers, ordering them to clean up the flat, the defendants said.

They refused and Lewis said the man had rushed toward them. He picked up a stone and Reece armed himself with a plant pot and pulled the gate shut.

Mr Wootton retreated to his car from where he picked up a tyre iron and ran straight towards the brothers who dashed into the flat and blocked the door, the jury was told.

Lewis said the older man was banging on the door and screaming and Reece went upstairs to get his mother. It went quiet and the brothers thought he had left but then turned to find he had got into property, possibly through a window, and was heading towards them, holding the wheel brace over his head.

The siblings ran outside. Lewis said: ‘I ran straight to the scaffold wagon. I just picked up a pole, the closest one to me.’

Why, he was asked by defence counsel David Clegg. ‘To defend myself,’ he replied. ‘There was no other possible way I could do that. He approached me still holding the tyre iron raised above his head. I hit him in the shoulder. I just swung it, just trying to keep him away.’

As the video showed, Reece ran around the side of Mr Wootton and hit him once on the left leg with the scaffolding pole.

He told the jury: ‘At that moment I didn’t want to hurt him or damage him - I wanted him to stay away.’

‘Did you think you were a bit over the top?’ prosecutor Peter Connick asked him. ‘In that situation I didn’t know what to think,’ he replied.