Investigations continue following assault on Bilston pub landlady

Diane Elcock needed hospital treatment after she was attacked by three people at a well-known music venue on Sunday night.

Miss Elcock was working behind the bar at The Trumpet in Bilston when a man and a woman she had previously barred from the pub returned with another man.

The attack left her with a broken nose, a black eye, and bruises to her body.

A spokeswoman for West Midlands Police said: "We were called at around 7.50pm on Sunday after a woman was assaulted at a pub on High Street, Bilston.

"The woman was punched several times and was taken to hospital with injuries not believed to be serious.

"A man, aged 59 and a woman, aged 26 from Wolverhampton were arrested on suspicion of assault. They have been bailed pending further inquiries."

Miss Elcock, 50, who also works as a schoolteacher in West Bromwich, has been running the well-known jazz venue with her partner Musti Bouameur for the past 12 years.

She said she now lived in fear they would return. 

The incident happened at about 7.30pm. Earlier in the afternoon she said she had asked a middle-aged man and a younger woman, who had previously been barred from the pub, to leave. 

"I told them it would be better that they drank somewhere else, and  then went out the back to put some distance between them and myself," she said.

"When I went back, they had gone, and I thought that was the end of it."

But at about 7.30 in the evening she said they returned with another man, and the woman walked behind the bar and grabbed hold of Miss Elcock by the neck.

"She had me in a headlock, and punched me in he head," she said.

"She was pulling my hair and hitting me. I was trying to get till switched off behind me, and one of the males started to bang on the till, trying to release the till.

"The other male was starting to take the bottles of the shelf. The girl continued to punch me, the male then started to punch me in the head. She then got me down, low, and I was shouting and screaming for help.

"My elderly customer who was in the pub started to come towards me, trying to help, telling them to leave me alone, and he came to the bar, they pushed him to the ground and started to kick him. 

"I was trying to escape, to get lose from behind the bar. As I fell down to the floor, the girl grabbed hold of me again,, and then she pushed me onto one of the sofas, she got my hair and got my head pulled down towards the ground, and she was inviting the two men to punch me in the head while she held me."

Mr Bouameur, who was upstairs at the time, heard the commotion and went down to help. Outside the pub, the woman made threats that 'your pub is finished,' Miss Elcock added.

Anyone with any information is asked to contact police on 101 quoting reference 20/882252/24 or alternatively use the livechat service on the force website.