A TEENAGER who admitted hitting a fellow partygoer in the head with a Champagne bottle has been cleared of unlawful wounding.

Jurors spent just over an hour deliberating over the case yesterday before unanimously finding 19-year-old Luc Foley, of Whitehouse Road, Oxford, not guilty of the charge.

The case arose from a party held to mark the birthdays of brother and sister Sophie and Jack Bull, who were turning 18 and 21, at Jemmetts Farm in Thame on May 6, 2012.

About 200 people were invited to the black tie celebration, Oxford Crown Court heard during the trial.

The incident happened after a dispute between two different groups at the party — Sophie’s younger friends and older friends of her brother — when Foley’s friend, Aaron Morey, came into a marquee where 15 to 20 people were planning to bed down for the night, looking for his dinner jacket.

Foley, who gave evidence in his defence on Thursday, said he had been trying to break up the disturbance and “instinctively lashed out” when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

George Lane, 21, ended up with a 6cm gash in his forehead.

Summing up, Judge Gordon Risius said: “This case is about whether Mr Foley was acting lawfully or unlawfully when he struck George Lane.

“You must judge the reasonableness of Mr Foley swinging the bottle according to his own belief of the situation, bearing in mind in the heat of the moment a person cannot be expected to work out exactly how much force is needed.”

Foley, a student at Bristol University, declined to comment after the jury returned its verdict.