WORSHIPPERS returning from midnight mass on Christmas morning witnessed a drink-fuelled street brawl and a knife-wielding man, a court heard.

Dominic Guy Mallinson, 22, was trying to prevent his brother, who had an injured ankle, getting into an ambulance in Main Street, Church Fenton, prosecutor Rosemary Ainslie told York Crown Court.

At one stage he threatened to get a shotgun.

Earlier he had left the pub, where he had been celebrating the festive season, and fetched a kitchen knife to frighten a fellow drinker.

Mallinson, of Main Street, Church Fenton, pleaded guilty to affray.

"You armed yourself with a quite intimidating looking kitchen knife," said Judge Peter Benson, after inspecting the weapon.

"It must have been a very alarming experience for some of the people you threatened in that way.

"Happily, no one was injured."

He gave Mallinson a community order, with 120 hours' unpaid work and 12 months' supervision, and ordered him to pay £150 prosecution costs.

Mallinson had previous convictions for being drunk and disorderly, and for violence and burglary.

Mrs Ainslie said that at 20 minutes after midnight, eyewitnesses Nicola and Ian Wrightson had stopped outside the White Horse pub in Church Fenton on their way home after mass, while their daughter fetched something she had left there earlier.

They saw a group, with Mallinson's injured brother, waiting for an ambulance in the street.

Then Mallinson approached the group with the knife behind his back.

"He shouted obscenities at the group.

"He was saying he wasn't going to allow the injured man to get into the ambulance," said Mrs Ainslie.

A scuffle broke out, during which someone - not Mallinson - threw the knife, and it was embedded in a fence.

Mr Wrightson grabbed it and kept it.

"The defendant was standing in the middle of the road, saying that he would get a 12-bore shotgun," said Mrs Ainslie.

Mallinson then ran off, and was arrested at home.

He told police someone had punched him in the pub after his brother's ankle was broken earlier in the evening, and he had been angry.

For Mallinson, Nicholas de la Poer said the man who punched him was "absolutely huge man, massive", so he had gone home to get a knife before tackling him.

He said Mallinson had never intended to use it.

Mallinson had only wanted the other man to feel as scared and helpless as he had felt.