A man has been found guilty of carrying out an acid attack in a packed London club which left several people injured.

Arthur Collins, the ex-boyfriend of reality TV star Ferne McCann, threw the corrosive substance at revellers in Mangle E8 in Dalston on 17 April.

The 25-year-old admitted throwing the liquid but had claimed he believed it was a date rape drug. He was convicted at Wood Green Crown Court. Andre Phoenix, who was accused of helping him, was found not guilty.

More than a dozen people suffered burns when Collins sprayed acid over revellers inside the busy east London venue at about 01:00 BST.

CCTV shown in court showed clubbers clutching their faces and running off the dancefloor as they were hit with the liquid.

Victims told the jury their skin began “blistering straight away” and described a burning smell. The liquid was later found to have a rating of pH1, equal to strong acids such as those used in battery acid.

Collins told the court during the trial he had been at the club celebrating the news of Ms McCann’s pregnancy, which the couple had revealed to her family the previous day. He was seen on CCTV getting into a confrontation with a group of men in the club before he sprayed liquid from a bottle over the crowd.

Collins, of Broxbourne, Hertfordshire, had claimed he had taken the bottle from that group and thought it was a date rape drug. However, the jury found him guilty of five counts of GBH with intent, and nine counts of ABH against 14 people.

Collins will be sentenced on 19 December.

He was not arrested for several days after the attack and was eventually detained when officers Tasered him after he tried to flee by jumping from an upstairs window of a house in Northamptonshire.

Scotland Yard said he answered no comment to all questions put to him after he was detained. Det Ch Supt Simon Laurence said Collins had intended to “inflict serious harm” on a large number of people in a “barbaric and cowardly act”.