AN axe-wielding thug who gatecrashed a party and attacked a teenager has been jailed for 15 months.

Ross Kelly was angry about not being invited to a booze-up involving some of his friends in Middlesbrough.

The 21-year-old turned up with two other pals at the house and pulled organiser Ashley Lavery from the front room.

Kelly then attacked his 17-year-old friend, Aaron Sergeant, who was a guest at the event, after asking him: "Why didn't you invite me. Don't you like me any more?"

Teesside Crown Court heard yesterday that Kelly headbutted, punched and repeatedly kicked the cowering teenager.

The former youth worker struck Aaron on the foot with the axe, smashed it across his back and then lashed out at a door and wooden flooring.

Prosecutor Christine Egerton said Kelly left the house in The Avenue and the victim's friends carried out first aid before taking him to hospital.

Doctors put four stitches in Mr Sergeant's back wound, which was bleeding heavily after the attack on June 18 last year.

Kelly, of Melbourne House, Middlesbrough, handed himself into police more than two months later, when he heard they were looking for him.

But he told officers that, although he was at the house and there had been a fight, he was not responsible for any injuries that were caused.

Two partygoers, however, picked him out in an identification parade and he was charged, said Miss Egerton.

Kelly admitted affray, and was told by Judge David Bryant he would have been jailed for longer had he been charged with a wounding offence.

Judge Bryant said: "That affray amounted to an attack with an axe on somebody who, as far as I can see, gave you absolutely no cause to attack.

"You injured that person, and you caused considerable damage to the house in which this incident occurred."

David Lamb, mitigating, described Kelly's behaviour as bizarre and out-of-character, and said he was influenced by alcohol he had consumed with the others earlier in the day.

"When he is sober, he is a rational, articulate and intelligent young man," said Mr Lamb. "He understands he needs some form of help.

"When he was employed as a youth worker, he found that the most rewarding period of his life, with some form of stability, structure and organisation, but he doesn't have that now."