A policeman wept as he told a court he feared for his life when he struck a bouncer on the head with his baton.
PC Daren Egan broke down as he told Hove Crown Court he thought Ian Jackson was going to kill him.
He was giving evidence at the trial of Jackson and three other Crawley bouncers accused of violent disorder outside the Honeyclub nightspot in Brighton on March 1, 2001.
PC Egan said: "He was coming for me. He was screaming he was going to kill me.
"I thought he was capable of it. From memory I hit him with my baton on the legs."
He said his colleague PC David Lovett was beside him crying and he thought: "We are in deep trouble here."
PC Egan said: "At that point I made a decision that I was going to strike him and I did. I moved to the right and struck him right in the middle of the head."
The court heard officers must only strike people on the head in extreme circumstances.
Jackson later went to hospital with PC David Nicholson while PC Egan arrested two of his friends, Simon Grimmer and Wayne Howell.
Grimmer, 26, of Abinger Road, Redhill; Howell, 25, and Jackson, 37, both of Roffey Close, Horley, and Robert Cohen, 25, of Climping Road, Ifield, Crawley, deny violent disorder.
The trial continues.
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