Winehouse husband to serve more jail time

By Mike Collett-White

LONDON (Reuters) - The husband of singer Amy Winehouse was ordered to serve about four and a half more months in prison on Monday after he pleaded guilty to attacking a pub landlord in 2006 and then trying to cover it up.

Blake Fielder-Civil, 26, sat with his three co-defendants before judge David Radford at Snaresbrook Crown Court in east London as the sentences were read out.

"I read that you, Blake Fielder-Civil, were affected by drink and cocaine and that in that drunken and drugged state took part in this attack out of a mistaken sense of loyalty to your friend Michael Brown," Radford said.

He added that Fielder-Civil, who married Winehouse in Miami in 2007, "behaved in a gratuitous, cowardly and disgraceful way", and sentenced the former video assistant to 27 months in prison, of which he will only have to serve half.

Fielder-Civil's lawyer, Jeremy Dein, explained afterwards that the sentence effectively meant his client had another four and a half months to serve, having been behind bars already for around nine months.

Winehouse, 24, was not in court to learn her husband's fate. The Grammy-winning star has referred frequently to Fielder-Civil and the case during recent stage performances.

Brown, 40, who also pleaded guilty to the attack and conspiring to pervert the course of justice, was sentenced to 33 months in prison, while Anthony Kelly, described in court as the architect of the cover-up attempt, got 20 months.

The fourth defendant, 20-year-old James Kennedy, was handed a suspended sentence.