A MAN punched a woman in the face on the staircase leading to her flat when she could not give him a cigarette.
The 44-year-old woman was about to start climbing the stairs in Springfields, off Round Hills, Waltham Abbey, just before 7pm on Monday when the man asked for a cigarette.
When she said she did not have any, he punched her and she hit her face on part of the metal staircase.
She struggled upstairs to her flat and went to bed, waking up in the early hours of Tuesday morning feeling groggy, with an egg-sized lump above her right eye, bruising and a swollen face.
She is expected to receive the results of an X-ray next week.
The attack was reported to police on Wednesday, but due to her head injuries, the woman cannot remember much about what happened.
Anyone who saw the man enter the communal hallways of the flats should call police at Ongar station on 101.
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