Fellow lags were said to have press-ganged a prisoner into throwing poo and urine at a gaoler – under threat of physical and sexual violence.

Godwin Dayoni, 21, was expected to be sentenced at Oxford Crown Court on Thursday (March 30) for the assault on a prison officer at HMP Bullingdon in July 2021.

The attack – known as ‘potting’ – saw him throw a foul mixture of urine and faeces at the guard, striking him and splattering across a wall at the category B jail near Bicester.

On Thursday, Dayoni’s barrister asked judge Recorder Paul Reid to adjourn the case for the preparation of a pre-sentence report by the probation service, looking at potential alternatives to immediate custody.

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His client had effectively been press-ganged by other inmates into carrying out the assault on the guard.

Although Dayoni had no quarrel with his victim, others alleged he had made a racist comment.

“He was given no choice. He was 18 at the time, he was the smallest of the boys, they made threats to him, they threatened him with sexual violence and abuse in the prison setting,” his counsel said.

The lawyer acknowledged that ‘in the usual course of things’ Dayoni’s claims he had been forced into carrying out the attack would amount to a legal defence to the allegation.

However, his client did not wish to reopen his plea of guilty and wanted to be sentenced.

The barrister said his client suffered from physical ill-health and, while currently remanded in custody, had been a carer to his mother since he was 16-years-old.

Noting that Dayoni appeared over the video link from prison with a set of crutches alongside him, it was said the defendant had recently been in hospital after he was ‘run over by his brother’.

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After learning of this catalogue of misfortune, Recorder Reid told the defendant’s barrister: “You’ve said enough. I entirely agree [to an adjournment].”

The judge added that the sentencing was ‘complicated’ by the fact that Dayoni would also have to be dealt with for breaching an earlier suspended sentence order.

The case was adjourned until April 28. Dayoni, of Ilford, London, was remanded in custody.

Dayoni pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to administering a noxious substance with intent, an offence placed on the statute book in 1861.