A rookie policeman who became embroiled in a road-rage incident was scarred for life after being slashed from nose to jaw with a Stanley knife.

PC Shuaib Gafur, who had only just completed his police training, needed more than 30 stitches to his face. He also had wounds to his shoulder and back.

After a van swerved out in front of the PC’s car and cut him up twice, the 25-year-old police officer followed the vehicle into a Tesco petrol station at Osterley and confronted the driver prosecutor Alexandra Felix told a jury at Isleworth Crown Court on Tuesday.

The two men scuffled on the ground before Mr Gafur was left in a pool of blood while the driver leapt back into his van and drove off.

The van driver was married father-of-one Faisal Mohammad, 30, of Doyle House, Osbourne Road, Acton, who denied wounding PC Gafur with or without intent to cause him grievous bodily harm on March 25.

He was found guilty of the more serious charge and jailed for five years.

PC Gafur’s girlfriend Nehal Aggarwal told the court: “I noticed the van driver had a blade of some sort in his right hand – it looked like a Stanley knife.”

She said: “I was screaming for help. There were people watching but nobody would help. The van driver was covered in blood and I saw blood was literally spraying from Shuaib’s face.”

Mohammad, was traced by his van and eventually gave himself up to police, said counsel.

He denied the charges and claimed that he had acted in self-defence.

He said the officer got him in a head-lock and he was having difficulty in breathing. He had the Stanley knife on him for work as a builder, he said.

Jailing him, the judge, Recorder James Mulholland, told him: “This is an extremely serious matter and I have little choice but a substantial custodial sentence. I have no choice but to conclude that you have shown little if any remorse for your actions.”

As Mohammad was taken down, his wife and mother of his child fled the court in tears.