A TEENAGER who smashed a kitchen window as she tried to get back into a house party, blinded a man in one eye after glass was embedded in it.

Danielle Gardner, 18, avoided a spell in a youth offenders' institution after a judge at Newport Crown Court was told a "minor incident" had "terrible consequences".

Gardner, of Deer Brook, Greenmeadow, Cwmbran, attended the gathering on March 17 this year, with friends of the victim and his siblings. She left to get money, and an altercation took place in the house. Some people were pushed out and the door locked behind them.

On returning, she banged on a double-glazed kitchen window, which smashed, sending glass flying.

A shard stuck in the man's left eye was removed in hospital, but he has lost the sight in it, and a corneal transplant is the only way he might regain vision.

Gardner had pleaded guilty before magistrates to a charge of unlawful wounding.

In a statement read to the court, her victim called the week after the incident "the worst of my life" He woke up every day unable to see out of his left eye, and had perception and balance problems.

He was unable to take a railway engineering course due for health and safety reasons, which he called a "big blow". But he holds no grudge against Gardner.

Defence counsel Ieuan Bennett called the incident and its aftermath "something of a tragedy all round."

He said there had been an altercation at the house over a trivial matter and Gardner received a phone call telling her that her sister had been assaulted and was locked out and upset.

"She went to the back of the house trying to find out what happened," said Mr Bennett, who added that she banged on the window and it smashed.

"She ran off thinking she may have caused a small amount of damage, nothing more. A minor incident has had terrible consequences.

"She did not intend anything of this sort to happen."

Mr Bennett told judge Recorder Peter Rouch she is "incredibly remorseful" and has hardly ventured out since.

Recorder Rouch told Gardner that banging on the window was "stupid and reckless." He accepted she did not intend to injure and would not have foreseen the damage, "but at the end of the day, you are responsible for it."

He sentenced Gardner to 15 months, suspended for two years, and ordered her to pay £3,000 compensation to her victim.

She must also complete 140 hours of unpaid work and pay a £115 victim surcharge.