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A yob who fired a gun at his autistic pal’s house was mistakenly put in the same cell as his victim after he was arrested over a revenge stabbing.

Lewis Clarke, 18, shot at the front window of “vulnerable” William Cowley’s home, after accusing his friend of stealing cigarettes .

A week later Cowley, 17, plunged a knife into the kidney of a 17-year-old suspected associate of Clarke, leaving him fighting for his life.

The ECHO reports that bungling prison authorities then placed the two teens in the same cell – leading to Clarke attacking Cowley and leaving him hospitalised.

Cowley, of Gardner Road, was locked up for five years, with an extended three years on licence, at Liverpool Crown Court last August.

Speaking at the time, Jeremy Rawson, defending, said: “Due to an administration error they were placed in the same cell.

“The defendant was hospitalised as a result of that. He has now recovered.

“No contact should have been allowed, unfortunately it was, and the defendant was injured as a result.”

The incident took place at Werrington Prison in Stoke-on-Trent , where both youths were remanded following the violent incidents in May last year.

(Image: Liverpool Echo)

Clarke, of Southport Road, Formby, was last week handed seven-and-a-half years in a Young Offenders Institution.

He admitted possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence, possessing a firearm and two counts of possessing bullets.

He shot at Cowley’s house on May 14, when the teen was not at home, but his terrified family were present.

Cowley then took a knife out with him on May 21, when he got into a “fist fight” in an alleyway with a boy, who cannot be named.

Cowley stabbed his victim in the side of his body, causing a 10cm wound.

(Image: Liverpool Echo)

His victim was taken to hospital in a critical condition.

On Tuesday, Liverpool Crown Court heard how Clarke was part of a gang boasting an arsenal of deadly weapons - including the gun which killed 17-year-old Kevin Wilson in Toxteth in February 2015.

Police retrieved photographs of Clarke and his friends Malcolm Graham, 19, and Adam Mercer, 22, shamelessly showing off with the guns.

Video footage seized from Graham’s iPhone also revealed brazen Mercer snorting cocaine off a sawn-off shotgun, while cackling friends egged him on.

One of the guns recovered was a Baikal pistol, later found to have been the weapon which killed Kevin in Holmes Street, off Smithdown Road.

Graham, of Albert Road in Southport, and Mercer, of Cullen Street in Bootle, received 11 years in a Young Offenders Institution and three years in prison respectively.

Judge David Aubrey, QC, sentencing Clarke, said he helped in “perpetuating the circulation of lethal weapons in our society”.