A health boss will return to his duties as chief executive of Norwich Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) later this month after being cleared of assaulting his wife.

Jonathan Fagge appeared at Norwich Magistrates Court on Monday afternoon to face the assault charge which he had denied.

He was found not guilty after a one-day trial.

Mr Fagge stepped aside from his duties as chief executive of the CCG, which commissions health care for more than 200,000 people around Norwich, when he was charged late last year.

The CCG described his absence as 'compassionate leave' and the NHS group's chief finance officer took on the job as chief executive.

But a spokesman for the Norwich health commissioners said Mr Fagge would now return to his job as before.

The 44-year-old, of Priory View, Norwich, had always denied the allegations made by his wife, who is mother to his son.

Speaking after the case, Mr Fagge said: 'There was never any truth in this allegation and I'm hugely relieved the court has acquitted me today.

'I want two things now; I want to see my son and I want to get back to work.'

The pair, who had been together for 14 years, were in the process of separating, and Mr Fagge had been loading his belongings into a van to move out.

An argument broke out when Mrs Fagge saw her husband had loaded a brown leather armchair into the van, which she claimed her husband had promised their son could keep, the court heard on Monday.

Mrs Fagge claimed her husband had forcefully dragged her from the back of the van to stop her retrieving the chair, and she was thrown to the floor four times in the ensuing incident.

But the court agreed with Mr Fagge's version of events and cleared him.