A JURY has cleared a 61-year-old man of stabbing a teenager who walked into his Breightmet home.

At Bolton Crown Court, 19-year-old Thomas Laisby had claimed that Kenneth Tracey was a cannabis dealer and he had gone to the elderly man’s home with friends who wanted to buy the drug.

Mr Laisby alleged that he had never met Mr Tracey before he had walked into his Deepdale Road house uninvited, which had angered Mr Tracey.

The court heard that Mr Tracey attacked Mr Laisby in the hallway with a kitchen knife, stabbing him in the back and the armpit, puncturing his lung.

But Mr Tracey claimed that Mr Laisby was a drug runner who attempted to rob him. He alleged he had to stab the teenager in self defence.

Mr Tracey told the court that he had picked up a filleting knife from a kitchen draining board after Mr Laisby and another man, Jamie Cooper, came to his house on April 19 last year, kicking and hitting him after demanding cannabis and cash.

Mr Tracey had denied charges of wounding with intent and unlawful wounding and, following a four-day trial, a jury found him not guilty of both.