A ‘ONE man crime wave’ from Buckfastleigh has been jailed after he went on a nine months spree of violence at seaside towns around Devon.

Danny Morgan attacked his girlfriend at Chudleigh, terrorised tourists in Exmouth, punched friends who had offered him a home in Axminster and battered a teenaged arcade worker with a baseball bat.

He was already on a suspended sentence and supposed to be on a course to address his record of domestic violence but he skipped a string of appointments, moved away from his home in Buckfastleigh and went off radar.

He failed to take medication for his mental health and ‘lost it’ after failing to benefit from an alcohol treatment programme.

His reoffending started with three attacks on his partner, one at the Finlake Caravan Park in Chudleigh in which he also smashed her phone. He went on to kick down the front door of a house where she was staying and to rip off her top before smashing up the car of a woman who went to her rescue.

Morgan was staying with friends at the Devon Cliffs Holiday Park at Sandy Bay, Exmouth, when they got drunk and caused a fracas in a bar where he assaulted a member of staff who tried to calm him down.

He then moved to Axminster where he fell out with three friends at whose home he was sofa surfing and attacked them, punching one woman on the jaw and attacking the police who arrested him, kicking one and spitting at another.

He had been released on bail or under investigation after all of the previous offences and was only locked up after he went on his final rampage at an amusement arcade in Paignton in June this year.

He was ordered out because he was drunk but returned and attacked a 16-year-old cashier with a baseball bat before confronting passers-by with two broken bottles.

Morgan, aged 24, of Market Street, Buckfastleigh, admitted affray, assault causing actual bodily harm, three assaults on emergency workers, three of threatening behaviour, two of criminal damage, two of possessing cannabis, theft, battery and breach of a community order and a suspended sentence.

He was jailed for a total 25 months by Judge Robert Linford, who described him as ‘a one-man crime wave’ at Exeter Crown Court.

He told him: 'I made you subject to a suspended sentence in January 2022. You repaid my indulgent and as it turned out erroneous approach by not engaging with it in any meaningful way and committing these 14 offences.'

Miss Beth Rickerby, prosecuting, said the offences were all committed in different locations around Devon between September 2022 and June 2023.

A 91-year-old who was recovering from a stroke was inside the house where Morgan kicked down the front door during a row with his ex-partner and a female police sergeant was left feeling disgusted after he spat into her face while claiming to be HIV positive.

The final attack in the arcade in Paignton was on a teenaged employee who was left with defence injuries on his arms and hands after being hit with a baseball bat.

He then went into a shop, stole two bottles, smashed them against each other and used their jagged edges to threaten people who tried to calm him down.

Mr William Parkhill, defending, said Morgan hopes to address issues of alcohol and mental health while in prison and make a fresh start when he is released.

He said he was living a chaotic life without a steeled home and failing to take mental health medication when he committed the offences.

He said: 'He was homeless and without a stable address and sometimes without a mobile phone and found it difficult to obtain or take his medication.

'His estimation is that after about six days he would ‘lose it’. Alcohol was also freely consumed and was a problem.'