A BOYFRIEND who punched and kicked his girlfriend in the street when she was seven-and-a-half months pregnant wants to rebuild their relationship, magistrates heard.

Hilary Reece, prosecuting, said a security staff member at York St John’s University ran out to intervene when he saw what Martin Lee Johnson, 19, was doing in Lord Mayor’s Walk, York.

He had noticed Johnson’s aggression on the university CCTV cameras and seen that the young woman kept her hands down by her side as Johnson was pointing at her, getting up close to her face.

When the situation escalated, he ran out and shouted. Johnson ran off and the security man went to the girlfriend’s aid.

“She was sobbing and screaming,” said Ms Reece.

Johnson’s solicitor, Kevin Blount, said the couple were back together.

Johnson, of Thames House, Albert Street, off Walmgate, York, pleaded guilty to assault.

He was given a community order with two years’ supervision, a rehabilitation course in building relationships and was ordered to pay £100 prosecution costs and a £60 statutory surcharge.

Mr Blount said the baby had come very early in the couple’s relationship.

Johnson had been going through difficulties on the day of the assault and was walking home from York Hospital with his girlfriend when the incident happened.

The baby has now been born.