Bassetlaw man risked prison sentence by arming himself with knife against gang

Jordan O’Keefe was arrested on Scrooby Road, Harworth, on January 27, but told police he wouldn't have used it, said prosecutor Freddie Sail.

Chris Perry, mitigating, said O’Keefe, who has no previous convictions, now ‘realises he is looking down the barrel of a potential prison sentence’.

“I hope you can take the view he is not criminally minded - it was just a foolish decision,” he said.

“Earlier in the evening a gang had threatened the group he was with. He thought he would be safer if he had a knife with him.

“The reality is he would have been one man with a knife facing a gang – and the odds of that are terrible.

“Or he would use the knife to frighten them and then run the risk that someone will be injured or killed. A large number of the murder cases we deal with begin this way.

“To hear from a lawyer today that he stands the risk of going to prison has been enough to frighten him on to the straight and narrow.”

O’Keefe, 21, of Styrrup Road, Harworth, admitted possessing a blade when he appeared at Mansfield Magistrate Court, on Tuesday.

The presiding magistrate said: "Courts take knife offences very seriously because you hear about someone being stabbed every other day.”

He received a four-month prison term, suspended for 12 months, with 80 hours of unpaid work.

He must pay £85 costs and a £154 surcharge.