A GWENT police officer on trial for allegedly wounding a man by biting him outside a Cardiff nightclub has stated he was defending himself after a man “latched on to his lip” in a fight.

DC Stephen Smith, of Gwent Police, is on trial at Cardiff Crown Court charged with wounding and perverting the course of justice.

The 33-year-old, from Dukestown, Tredegar, denies both charges – the second of which relates to a series of Facebook messages sent following the incident.

The alleged assault happened on March 12 last year outside Brewhouse, St Mary Street, Cardiff, as fans flocked to watch the Six Nations England v Wales clash at Twickenham.

Yesterday an interview transcript from March 13 was read to the jury with Smith telling police that claimant Jonathan Harris was being “aggressive” and “looked like he was going to throw a punch” at his girlfriend.

The court heard the two men clashed with “foreheads touching” and Smith said he used his incisor to “bite (Harris) to make him let go” after the claimant bit first in the encounter.

Smith told police: “I had to do it to get him off. There was no other way as he was latched on to it (the lip). I just wanted to get away from him. It was literally over in like seconds.”

The off-duty officer also told South Wales Police he was around a “six or seven out of 10” on a scale of intoxication and was trying to “diffuse the situation and control Harris”.

Following the incident, Smith was seen on CCTV in a Wales jersey walking away from the scene with his girlfriend before being arrested by police.

Shortly after the Cardiff incident, police were made aware of a series of Facebook messages between Smith and a profile under the name of the complainant Jonathan Harris.

The messages sent to Smith’s Facebook profile suggest the complainant also bit Smith, was “coked-up” during the incident and offered to settle the case out of court for £1,000. Harris denies writing the messages.

The jury heard South Wales Police “downloaded” Harris’ Facebook profile which had no trace of messages to Smith. Smith also denies responding to the Facebook messages.

Smith was arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice and several items were seized including a laptop and hard drive.

Prosecutor Owen Williams argued that Smith was the author of Harris’ messages by either hacking his Facebook account or setting up a spoof or “fake” profile.

Police were also unable to recover messages from Smith’s profile as he made a request to Facebook for it to be permanently deleted.

The court heard Smith was considering paying compensation to Harris but decided to “come off” Facebook.

The officer also disagrees with Harris’ claims that screenshots of the Facebook conversation were “photoshopped”.

A digital forensic and cybercrime expert revealed Smith’s seized hard drive contained internet history on March 2 and 3, 2014, relating to searches for Facebook hacking software and password decryption.

Andrew Taylor, defending Smith, stated that “there was nothing to suggest that the person who looked for that information did anything with it”.

Proceeding.