Last updated at 11:58, Monday, 11 March 2013

A father banned by a judge from his family home “erupted in fury” after two social workers found him there, hiding under his baby daughter’s cot.

Judge Paul Batty

The man – with a long record of violence and dishonesty – had gone to the house near Carlisle despite “protracted hearings in the family court” which had resulted in him being prevented from seeing his children.

But while he was there two social workers called in response to concerns that the children might be at risk because their mother was behaving in an irrational way, Carlisle Crown Court was told. When the female social workers arrived they found the “dishevelled” mother with a three-quarter drunk bottle of vodka under her jacket.

They said they would have to take the children away, but then they heard the sound of “snoring” coming from a child’s bedroom.

When they went to investigate they found the man’s legs sticking out from under the cot.

The man, who cannot be named so as to avoid identifying his children, then launched an angry tirade against the women, saying he “hated” them and threatening that he would shoot them with a gun.

He then said he was going to “blow everybody up” and would pour paint over Judge Barbara Forrester, the judge who had overseen the family court proceedings.

The man was at the city’s crown court to appeal against a four-month prison sentence imposed by city magistrates, who had found him guilty of common assault on both social workers. But after hearing the evidence Judge Paul Batty QC dismissed his appeal against the convictions.

He increased the sentence from four months to six months.

First published at 11:30, Monday, 11 March 2013
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk