A TEENAGER described as a blight on his home town was sentenced to six months in custody yesterday.

James Brabbs, 19, was also given a two-year Criminal Anti- Social Behaviour Order (Crasbo) after admitting nine different offences.

Brabbs, of Paradise Fields, Easingwold, pleaded guilty to smashing 54 windows at Easingwold School, setting fire to a ten-yard leylandi hedge at Easingwold Bowls Club and threatening to kill two police officers.

He also admitted failing to surrender to bail, breaking a car window, disorderly behaviour and causing a nuisance on school premises.

All the offences took place in September, November and December last year.

Alison Whiteley, prosecuting, told Northallerton Magistrates' Court that Brabbs had threatened the police officers after being arrested for breaking the car window.

"He shouted that he would shoot the officers and would go round to their houses and kill their families," she said.

"They were subjected to a great deal of verbal abuse."

Mrs Whiteley read a statement from Hambleton community safety officers. They said Brabbs was causing problems around Easingwold's Galtres Centre and was influencing younger teenagers, causing them to commit acts of anti-social behaviour.

In mitigation, Brabbs' solicitor, Charles Shirtcliffe, said his parents had split up when he was three and he had spent time in care.

"He has had a life of great personal misery and suffering and one wouldn't wish it on a dog," said Mr Shirtcliffe, adding that Brabbs had started using drugs at 13.

"He has had a period when he has been a blight on Easingwold."

Sentencing Brabbs to a total of six months in a young offenders' institution, chair of the bench Jenny Stourton told him: "We believe that this behaviour is so serious and so persistent that custody is the only thing we can do."

The Criminal Anti Social Behaviour Order will come into effect when he is released. Its conditions include not inciting others to cause harassment, alarm or distress, not entering the grounds of Easingwold School, not being drunk within a 15-mile radius of the town and not going within 100 metres of the Galtres Centre. He will also be subject to a six-month curfew.