A SHOPLIFTER who twice threatened to hurt shop staff has lost his appeal against his jail term.

Stephen Robert Wainwright, 42, told a male shop worker: “I will knock your jaw in,” York Crown Court heard.

The next day, in the same shop, he told a woman working in the shop: “I will knock you out, I will return if you keep getting in my way.”

Kelly Clarke, for the CPS, said York magistrates jailed Wainwright for 25 weeks for the threats and five shop thefts.

For Wainwright, Daniel Ingham said he appealed against his sentence on the grounds the threats were “not really to cause fear of serious injury”.

But Judge Simon Hickey, sitting with two magistrates, disagreed with the defence barrister’s assessment.

“He is lucky he got 25 weeks. It could have been longer,” the judge said.

“They were people doing their public duty, one female, one male.”

The offences were aggravated by Wainwright’s long history of a quarter of a century of violence and other crimes, starting when he was 17.

Wainwright’s nearly 200 previous convictions included serving eight years for four robberies and an attempted robbery and 19 months for causing actual bodily harm and carrying a knife.

He had many convictions for violence, threatening behaviour, racially aggravated harassment, shop theft and burglary.

The bench dismissed the appeal.

Wainwright, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to five shop thefts and two offences of using threatening words or behaviour.

Ms Clarke said Wainwright stole cat food worth £41.94 from FarmFoods in Selby on January 6 and a similar amount of cat food from the same store on January 24.

On February 1 and February 8 he stole washing liquid from the same store worth together £56.95 and on February 17, he stole items worth £100 from Poundland in Selby.

The threatening words and behaviour both happened in Poundland. On February 8, he threatened the male store worker and on February 9 the female store worker.

He was jailed for eight weeks for the January shop thefts plus 17 weeks for the threatening behaviour and 12 weeks to be served concurrently for the February shop thefts.

Mr Ingham said Wainwright accepted he should be jailed for the shop thefts but claimed that the sentence for the threatening behaviour was excessive.

Wainwright had been addicted to drugs “on and off” for years and had the offer of accommodation if he were released.

He was remorseful for his actions.

Since being sent to jail 32 days earlier, he had worked on tackling his addiction and got a qualification to help him find work on his release, the court heard.