Scarborough thug jailed after running amok with large knife, knuckle duster, vodka bottle and long metal bar
A Scarborough thug has been jailed after running amok in the street with a knife, a knuckle duster and a glass vodka bottle, before trying to stab a man and then attacking police.
CCTV footage showed Leon Upson, 18, swinging a glass bottle during a stand-off with a man armed with a baseball bat in Friargate.
When police arrived, they found a knife, a gold knuckleduster and the vodka bottle which had been dumped nearby, York Crown Court heard.
Prosecutor Jordan Parkinson said that when officers tried to arrest Upson, he resisted violently and kicked out at a police inspector, striking his wrist.
As Upson “flailed around”, he tried to headbutt the officer and then spat on him.
Another officer used pepper spray to bring Upson under control and he was finally cuffed and placed in a police van.
En route to the police station, Upson spat all over the back of the vehicle which required a deep clean.
He was released from custody after refusing to answer police questions but just six days later, on May 11, he was involved in another disturbing incident in the street – two days after receiving a suspended prison sentence for burglary.
On this occasion, a delivery driver in Scarborough called police just after midnight to say that a group of men was fighting in the middle of the street – and Upson was right in the thick of it.
CCTV in Cross Street showed four youths running towards Upson who was brandishing a “large knife”.
Upson “ran towards one of the (men) with a large metallic object in his hand, trying to stab the other male”.
“The defendant misses (and) runs at the male (who) runs away,” said Ms Parkinson.
Upson continued to chase the youth down Cross Street, “raising his arm above his head, holding a long metal bar”.
When he reached the man, Upson raised the metal bar and tried to strike him with it, but missed.
When police arrived, Upson ran away, but he was found hiding in a small yard behind a flat after a search of the area.
“Officers found a metal bar discarded nearby,” added Ms Parkinson.
Upson, of Albemarle Crescent, was arrested again and charged with two counts of affray, two counts of assaulting a police officer and damaging property, namely the police van.
He admitted the offences and appeared for sentence on Wednesday, June 12, after being remanded in custody.
Ms Parkinson said Upson had five previous convictions for 11 offences.
At the time of the new offences, he was subject to a youth-rehabilitation order imposed in October last year for burglary, public disorder, theft of a bicycle and failing to provide a specimen for analysis.
By the time of the second affray, he was under a six-month suspended jail sentence with drug treatment, imposed two days earlier for burglary.
Defence barrister Zarreen Alan-Cheetham said Upson was “very ashamed” of his behaviour and being remanded in an adult prison for the first time in his young life had come as a “short, sharp shock”.
She said Upson had developed a cocaine and cannabis addiction years ago and left school without any qualifications.
Judge Simon Hickey said that notwithstanding Upson’s “disgusting” behaviour in both incidents, the fact alone that he had attacked and spat at a “public servant simply there to protect the public” was worthy of a prison sentence.
He said he would give Upson a consecutive sentence for breaching the suspended prison sentence by committing the second affray just a few days after it was imposed.
Upson was jailed for 16 months.