AN ex-convict who breached a suspended sentence order will not be sent straight to jail despite pleading guilty to possession of a knife and other offences.

Lewis Georgiou, 26, of Cawley Avenue, Prestwich, was sentenced for possession of a bladed article in public, driving while disqualified and driving without insurance at Bolton Crown Court.

Joshua Bowker, prosecuting, told the court Georgiou had been involved in an altercation with his former landlord, who he claimed owed the defendant £500, in Tennyson Road, Farnworth, on June 9.

The court heard that following this fracas, which saw Georgiou's BMW car damaged and him suffer other injuries, he drove away, reversing into a fence and driving into a concrete pillar.

Georgiou was later arrested and found to be in possession of a knife and the keys to the BMW.

On March 11, he pleaded guilty to the possession of a knife but said he had picked it up as he fled from the scene of the fracas, where he had got into the altercation, the court heard. But later Georgiou retracted that statement and he also pleaded guilty to both of the driving-related matters.

Andrew Evans, defending, said: “Where a defendant moves away from a scene after suffering trauma and significant injury, regardless of where it comes from, this is something that should be taken into account.”

Passing sentence, Recorder Nigel Grundy told Georgiou: “Now is the tipping point in your life when you can take back control. I can pull back from an immediate custodial sentence but only because of the unusual circumstances of this case.

“If you had driven there with the knife, and brandished the knife, there would have been no saving you.”

Georgiou was given an eight month prison sentence, suspended for two years.

He must also undertake 40 hours of unpaid work and 45 rehab activity days. He has also been ordered to pay a victim surcharge. This is on top of 110 hours which he has been ordered to undertake for previous convictions, which he has been unable to complete during the pandemic.