A thug who went on a rampage around Maidstone, threatening a two-year-old girl in a pram and spitting at an armed police officer, has been jailed for eight months.

Dean Yeo, of Wallis Avenue, Park Wood, previously admitted charges of threatening and abusive behaviour, racial abuse and assault following the disturbance last month.

Maidstone Magistrates’ Court heard on Wednesday, August 12, how the 39-year-old entered Xross-Polynation Gallery in Starnes Court, off Union Street, at about midday on Saturday, July 18.

He was asked to leave the closed building and became aggressive, racially abusing a member of staff before walking down Church Street.

Here he shouted in a toddler’s face “You little s***, you’re going to get it tonight” before turning on her five-year-old sister and parents.

A second confrontation with the gallery employee ended when the young girl's father intervened and punched him to the floor.

Yeo, who appeared under the influence of drugs, fled the scene, boarding a bus in High Street, where he was approached by an armed response team.

He pushed an officer over and spat at him before being arrested.

The court heard both the man who punched Yeo and the police officer have had to receive tests and precautionary treatment since the incident after Yeo claimed he had HIV.

Yeo, who has 23 convictions for 52 offences and a long history of mental illness, had been out of trouble since his release in 2007 from a psychiatric hospital where he had been indefinitely detained for biting off a woman’s nose.

Magistrates handed him two consecutive four-month sentences for racial abuse, plus a two-week term for assault and a four-week sentence for threatening behaviour, to run concurrently.

Yeo will have to pay an £80 victim surcharge and a £180 criminal court charge once he is released.