A BUS driver who used a child's baseball bat to attack her ex-partner has narrowly avoided going to jail.

Beverley Rickell assaulted former lover Paul Burlow outside her home in Marlborough Avenue, Kidlington, in September 2014, a month after their relationship fell apart.

Yesterday the 55-year-old was sentenced at Oxford Crown Court to six months in prison, suspended for 18 months, for assault occasioning actual bodily harm and criminal damage.

Judge Ian Pringle condemned her behaviour as "totally unacceptable".

He added: "We see in these courts, sadly, too many cases of domestic violence and they are almost always men attacking women.

"This time it's the other way round. I ask myself, if you had been a man attacking his ex-partner, what view would I take?

"I would have taken a very serious view indeed. Even though this is a woman on a man, we should not adopt any different attitude."

Defence barrister Lyall Thompson said Rickell was recently dismissed by employer Oxford Bus Company but was seeking to appeal against that decision.

He added: "While Miss Rickell accepts the verdict of the jury, she maintains her version of events."

During the trial last month, Oxford Bus Company driver Mr Burlow told the court he discovered his new girlfriend's T-shirts and underwear strewn across his car, which was parked in the company car park, and decided to confront Rickell.

He said he drove to her house, where she came at him with the bat and dented his car.

Jurors acquitted Rickell of a second count of criminal damage and one of theft.

Judge Pringle ordered her to carry out 120 hours' unpaid work and also made her the subject of a five-year restraining order.