The wife of a barrister fighting for his life after being assaulted by a gang of youths today made a public appeal to trace his attackers.

She said the attack on her husband after he strolled home from a barbecue in Poole, Dorset, had "completely devastated" the family. The family could not have a life again until they knew he was going to survive, she added.

A group of eight or nine teenagers aged between 15 and 19, who were described by police as "spoiling for trouble", attacked 42-year-old Peter Wareing as he and two friends were walking home just after midnight on Saturday.

They punched him to the ground and his head hit the floor. He is in a critical condition with severe head injuries after being transferred to the neurological unit of Southampton General Hospital.

His two friends - a man and a woman both aged 34 - were also attacked, but were released from hospital yesterday after treatment for facial injuries.

The barrister’s wife, who issued a statement through Dorset Police, said: "The attack on my husband has completely devastated all of us. He was just beginning a very promising career as a barrister after training for five or six years and had just qualified working for a firm of solicitors.

"My husband is a family man and his children and myself are central to his life. The children idolised him. He was our life and that is no exaggeration. We cannot begin to have a life again until we know he is going to survive. It’s a case of is he going to live?"

She said that the attack on her husband was "not personal" and was just an "act of mindless vandalism". She said: "My husband is not going to recover to the man he was. The people who have attacked him in the street on Saturday night have wrecked our family’s lives.

"He is an ordinary man who was walking home from an ordinary barbecue - how many people are going to do that this summer?

"To anyone with information please come forward to the police as soon as possible for the sake of the family. It could have been your husband, your father, your brother. Please come forward."

Detective Inspector Steve Thorpe of Poole CID said yesterday that it was a totally unprovoked attack. He said: "The friends were walking along Churchill Road, when they saw a group of eight or nine teenagers. It was obvious that the teenagers were spoiling for trouble.

"Without warning a teenage girl grabbed the woman by her hair, punched her and pulled her to the floor. At the same time a 34-year-old Bournemouth man was pushed over a low garden wall.

"The friends tried to walk away, but were attacked again and the 42-year-old Poole man was punched and fell to the floor, knocking his head on the pavement.

"The teenagers are all believed to be between 15 and 19 years of age and after the attack made off together.

"It’s quite likely that those in the group didn’t intend for anyone to be as severely injured as has happened and I’m appealing to them to search their consciences and please come forward. How would you feel if the injured man was your father?

"It’s likely - because there were a number of young people involved - that word will spread about this assault and those responsible, and I’m appealing to anyone with such information to contact me in confidence," added Detective Inspector Thorpe.

Mrs Wareing said that the family had been looking forward to its summer activity, and had already booked a skiing holiday in February.

"On Father’s Day we were going to Fordingbridge to enjoy a picnic as a family. Instead of that I had to sit the children down at home on the sofa and tell them what had happened to their father," she said.

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