A bus user has been jailed for terrorising passengers and threatening the driver with a knife.

Samuel Winning (pictured) was drunk before he got on the late night bus from Torquay to Newton Abbot and started arguing with his girlfriend before turning on other passengers.

He attacked two teenaged boys on the top deck and when they were ushered downstairs by other passengers, he followed them and pulled out a knife.

He held the blade just inches from the face of the driver as he ordered him to stop the bus and prevented him pulling up the protective glass screen.

Winning confronted a new passenger who tried to get on after the bus stopped in Kingskerswell and held the knife close to his face.

He fled back to the upper deck when police arrived and only dropped the knife after he was threatened with a taser. He told police he had drunk a litre-and-a-half of vodka and could not remember what he had done.

He jumped bail after being released on a tag and fled to live with his family in Brittany, where he worked as a stonemason before returning to Britain and being arrested.

Ex-soldier Winning, aged 29, of Garston Avenue, Newton Abbot, admitted affray, possession of a bladed article, and a bail act offence.

He was jailed for a total of 16 months by Judge David Evans at Exeter Crown Court. He told him: ‘The people on the bus were terrified by your behaviour and deeply fearful of what you might do next.

‘They were scared that you might use the knife, given your highly aggressive behaviour. The aggravating features are the timing and location, late at night on public transport in the presence of passengers.

‘The offences also involved the bus driver who was doing his job and providing a service for the public.’

Mr Brian Fitzherbert, prosecuting, said Winning was on the top deck of the bus shortly before midnight on November 11, 2017, when he started threatening a group of teenaged boys.

He pushed one and punched another in the face before adult passengers intervened and everyone moved to the lower deck, leaving Winning and his girlfriend upstairs.

He then came down the steps armed with a knife with a two-inch blade and threatened the driver, holding down the security screen to stop him lifting it.

He threatened to stab him and also held the knife towards a passenger who tried to get on at Kingskerswell.

Victim impact statements from the boys, the driver, and a passenger all said they had been terrified by the experience.

Mr William Parkhill, mitigating, said the incident happened when Winning was in a destructive relationship which led him into heavy drinking.

He jumped bail because a friend had taken his own life in custody and he was terrified of going to jail. He has a job and a home waiting for him in France when he is released.