A 16-year-old youth was expelled after threatening a classmate with a knife in the playground of an Abingdon comprehensive school, a court heard.

The teenager was alleged to have demanded "Do you want a fight?" as he grabbed the other youth by the shoulder and held the seven-inch blade close to his stomach.

The ugly incident at Larkmead School was spotted by a playground assistant and immediately reported to the headteacher, Wantage youth court heard yesterday (Fri).

Police were called and the knife was discovered during a search of the youth, who told them he used it to "fiddle with a radio-controlled car", prosecutor Bill White told the magistrates.

Interviewed later, the boy denied all knowledge of the knife, and said he had discovered it in his school bag at break. He had not told the staff about it, and had decided to hang on to it until the end of the school day with the intention of dumping it.

Mr White said the boy claimed he had only taken it out of his bag in the playground to ask other pupils what to do with it.

The youth, who was expelled after the incident last January, appeared for sentence after pleading guilty at an earlier hearing to possession of a blade on school premises.

He was ordered to carry out 40 hours' community service, and magistrates ordered the knife should be destroyed.

Maria-Elena Pozuelo (OK), defending, said her client had been using the knife to repair his model car and had forgotten to take it out of his bag before going to school.

"He does not know why he took it out and threatened the boy, and deeply regrets his actions. Clearly it must have been very frightening," she said.

After his immediate expulsion, the youth had received some home tuition but had only managed to sit four out of his intended 11 GCSE examinations.

He was pursuing job applications and visiting a JobCentre with the view to taking up fulltime employment, she added.

MSentencing the defendant, magistrates' chairman, Frank Smith, told him: "This serious offence with a knife cannot be tolerated, as it was in a school with lots of pupils around - and one in particular."

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