Transgender beautician spared jail for pushing an off-duty police officer onto Tube line

A transgender beautician has been spared a spell in a men's prison for pushing an off-duty police officer onto a Tube line after an alcohol-fuelled night out.

Paris Valeta Bregazzi, 30, had drunk four bottles of Prosecco and was arguing with a friend on the platform of Hanger Lane Station in Ealing when PC Sam Chegwin intervened last July.

He told her to calm down and she responded by telling him to mind his own business, unaware he was an officer, a court heard.

Fearing for public safety, PC Chegwin pushed her in the chest in a defensive manner, not knowing she had recently had extensive breast surgery.

Bregazzi reacted by shoving him with force, sending him toppling onto the track, just inches from the line with a fast train seven minutes away.

Last November, she pleaded guilty to carrying out an unlawful act on a railway with intent to endanger a person.

But Judge Jeremy Dein, QC, deferred deciding on her case amid concern for her "difficult" circumstances.

Her lawyer Mustapha Hakme conceded the offence passed the custody mark but argued for a community order as she had stayed out of trouble since.

He told the court Bregazzi, of Highgate, north London, was "calmer and more stable" now, despite having suffered from depression and mental health problems in the past.

Sentencing, Judge Dein told her it was lucky PC Chegwin was not seriously hurt.

The judge said the defendant had 39 convictions for "low level" crimes of theft and violence but had difficult circumstances and a history of mental health problems.

Handing her six months in prison, suspended for two years, he said:

Outside court, the defendant said she regretted what happened, saying it was "a scuffle".

Paris Lees, journalist, presenter, and transgender rights activist