A MAN who attacked an off-duty police officer as he tried to arrest a suspected thief was yesterday locked up for nine months.

Ian Metcalfe was one of two people who pulled up in a car as Sergeant Alex Clarke grappled with a teenager who was thought to have been riding a stolen scooter.

Metcalfe, 24, and accomplice Anthony Moore, 19, repeatedly punched the off-duty policeman until suspect Craig Perry managed to break free and began in turn to headbutt and bite the officer.

Moore and Perry were both jailed for nine months at earlier hearings and Metcalfe appeared at Teesside Crown Court yesterday to admit unlawful wounding.

Judge Les Spittle was urged by defending barrister Ron Mitchell not to jail Metcalfe, of Tankerville Street, Hartlepool, because he was of previous good character - unlike the other two - and had recently started a bricklaying and joinery course at college.

But Judge Spittle told him: "Police officers do a difficult enough job as it is and the only way they can be supported is if courts deal sufficiently with people who attack them."

The attack, which left the officer needing four stitches in a head wound, happened last July near his home in Hart Village, near Hartlepool.

Sgt Clarke, who is married with a two-year-old daughter, returned to work at Darlington police station shortly after the attack and earned glowing tributes from his bosses.

Sgt Clarke, who has 12 years' police service, said last night: "I had effectively put the incident behind me, but nevertheless I am pleased it is all over.

"The sentences are very much what I expected my attackers to receive and hopefully they will now have learned their lesson."