6:45am Friday 25th July 2008
A MOTHER pleaded with her young sons to keep quiet as she made a 999 call to the police after two men, one armed with a knife, had barged their way into their home late at night.
The drama began when Lisa Duffil heard persistent knocking on the front door and looking through a window, saw two men who wanted to see her boyfriend, Peter Wheeler. She told them to go away but they threatened to break the door down unless he spoke to them.
They came downstairs and after the back door of the house in Holbury had been unlocked, the pair - James Baker and an accomplice - walked in uninvited and demanded to see a friend of Mr Wheeler who Baker claimed had threatened him earlier that evening and who he believed was on the premises.
Prosecutor Carl Anderson said Baker had a kitchen knife, although he did not aim the weapon at Mr Wheeler or Ms Duffil.
Mr Wheeler fled to a neighbour for help, and Ms Duffil ran to the bathroom where she called the police. As one of the men came upstairs, she felt sick and started to panic.
Frightened that the man would catch her on the phone, she hung up, shouting to him that it was just her and two boys upstairs, and he went back downstairs.
Mr Anderson said she then heard footsteps outside the bathroom and realised one of her children was there. She opened the door, pulled the six-year-old inside and put her hand over his mouth to stop him making a noise.
She took her hand away and the boy said his four-year-old brother was awake and they ran into their bedroom where she told them to be quiet as she made a further 999 call.
As she did so, she heard a smashing sound downstairs and after the police had arrived within minutes, discovered the fish tank had been smashed.
The fish were "flopping about" on the floor.
Baker, 21, of Roewood Close, Holbury, admitted affray and possessing a bladed article. Jailing him for six months, Judge John Dixon said: "This was a premeditated and unwarranted attack on these people, although I accept no harm was caused and you didn't intend to use the knife.
"But you must be aware that from television and newspapers the public's concern of people carrying knives in public and saying you had it as self-defence is no excuse at all."
In mitigation, Graham Cooke urged the court to put Baker on a drug rehabilitation course so he could tackle the problem which he recognised was harming him.
Mr Cooke added: "The building blocks are in place and he has gained an insight into how his behaviour is affecting other people and himself."
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