Homeless man shouted abuse at Mansfield council officer for ‘hounding’ him

Denis Fairbanks was outside Morrisons in Mansfield Woodhouse on May 23, when he shouted, 'You're a f****** w*****' at the off-duty Mansfield District Council officer.

The prosecutor said the officer had his three children with him at the time and Fairbanks told one of them: "Your dad is a bully."

Magistrates heard the officer gave 29-year-old Fairbanks, who has 34 previous convictions for 58 offences, a community protection order in February.

Probation officer Martin Anderson said Fairbanks ‘believes the victim hounds him and moves him on from the area.’

He said the defendant, a former heroin-user, only takes cannabis now, doesn't drink alcohol and has no mental health issues.

"He recently moved to Mansfield Woodhouse to avoid homeless people and drug users,” he said.

Ryan Higginbotham, mitigating, said: “He has been fined a number of times and he has taken that in the wrong way. He is a man of limited means. It was an outburst of frustration.

“He has kept himself out of trouble for the last two and a half years.”

Fairbanks, 29, of no fixed address, admitted using threatening or abusive words or behaviour, when he appeared at Mansfield Magistrates Court, on July 6.

On Thursday he was ordered to pay £120 compensation which will be added to the £585 he already owes to the court.

The presiding magistrate told him: "In essence if you see him again, just walk away."