POLICE called to a top floor flat found a Frenchman waving a 3ft Samurai sword, a court heard yesterday.

Peter Jeffries, prosecuting, told Harrogate magistrates how Julien Guillaume Mercier was initially found at the top of a staircase at the flats in Westmoreland Street, Harrogate, shouting threats at the police while his mother, his English girlfriend and their 11-month-old son cowered.

When Mercier, 26, went out of sight for a moment police managed to shepherd the two women and the baby to the safety of the street.

But then the former care assistant in a Harrogate residential home, who is now working as a kitchen porter in a restaurant in the town, reappeared on the staircase armed with the Samurai sword. He began to strike the banister with it, while at the same time making threats to kill the police.

He did not respond to attempts to reason with him, but disappeared again to return a short time later minus the sword.

Mercier was then sprayed with CS gas which had little effect on him as he was able to run down the stairs and out into the street, pursued by police who caught him after a short chase.

As they were trying to get handcuffs on him he kicked out, striking one officer on the leg and also spat in his face, which caused an eye problem as there were still CS gas crystals in the spittle.

Mercier, of Knaresborough Road, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, admitted affray and assaulting PC Andrew Budimer.

He also admitted that he was in breach of a conditional discharge for a disorder behaviour offence, last year, and was made subject to a 12-month community rehabilitation order and told to pay £50 costs.

Presiding magistrate David Gravells told Mercier: "We are dealing here with an unpleasant incident of domestic violence involving vulnerable people and a frightening sword, followed by an assault on police. It is serious enough to warrant a community penalty."

For Mercier, Geoffrey Rogers said the sword, which was ordered to be destroyed, had been given to him as a present.

Editor’s note: We were contacted by the defendant’s son in June 2020, who told us that his father had been suffering from undiagnosed schizophrenia at the time of the offence and later took his own life. His son said: “He was a good man with a big heart who was misunderstood”.