A DRUNKEN trouble maker has been jailed for attacking a customer with a broken bottle at a late night taxi queue.

Morgan Driscoll armed himself with the bottle and advanced towards a complete stranger who was waiting for a cab behind the Jolly Farmer pub in Newton Abbot.

The customer suffered a cut hand after fending off Driscoll who claimed he was going to stab him. The attack on May 1 this year was almost identical to an incident six weeks earlier in which he waved a machete in Market Street.

He had been released on bail after the first offence but returned to Newton Abbot to carry out the second. Both happened in the early hours of the morning when Driscoll was drunk and possibly on drugs.

Driscoll, aged 20, of Lawns End, Bishopsteignton, admitted possession of a bladed article on March 11, and assault causing actual bodily harm and possessing a broken bottle as an offensive weapon on May 1.

He was jailed for 38 weeks in a Young Offenders Institution by Judge Anna Richardson at Exeter Crown Court where she told him it was impossible to suspend the sentence because he had failed to comply with an earlier community order.

She said: 'The report on your response to the previous order shows you have done none of the unpaid work which was ordered and provided no medical evidence.

'You have missed supervision appointments, and when you have attended your attitude has been dismissive what people are trying to do for you. Even those preparing the probation report found you had not engaged properly.

'I am sure that at some time in your life you will turn things around but at the moment you are not to be trusted to undertake rehabilitation in the community.

'The risk you run is finding yourself back here charged with something much worse that will ruin the rest of your life.'

Miss Feleena Grosvenor, prosecuting, said both incidents were caught on CCTV. The first clip showed Driscoll approaching a group of people near Newton Abbot market at 2.30 am and pulling out a machete.

He brandished the weapon but did not try to use it on anyone, even though some of the group came close to him. Police arrived and he was arrested and disarmed.

The second incident happened at a taxi rank behind the Jolly Farmer, near Market Street, at 2am on May 1. Driscoll approached a customer waiting for a taxi and lunged at him with a broken bottle.

He told him he was going to stab him and the victim suffered a small cut on his hand as he raised his arms to protect himself. It was treated at the scene and did not require hospital treatment.

Mr Paul Dentith, defending, said been under the influence of alcohol and ketamine or other drugs but has now realised it is time to address his problems with the help of a drug rehabilitation order.

He said drugs workers had assessed him as being nine out of ten for motivation and prospects of success in treatment