A teenager who blackmailed a man and robbed a shop assistant at knifepoint before he became an adult is today serving five and a half years in jail.

Wade Clifford Michael Kershaw, now 19, used a "murderous" weapon to terrify the 64-year-old woman in BNT stores in Nunthorpe Road, south York, the city's crown court heard.

He grabbed a bottle of gin and ran off but was arrested when he was seen near the shop later the same evening.

He appeared in court via a video link from Hull Prison where he is serving a jail term for blackmailing a man with physical and sexual threats to hand over money.

Wade, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to robbery and carrying a knife in public.

"It was a cowardly act against a decent member of society," the Recorder of York, Judge Sean Morris, said of the shop robbery.

"You were only 17 at the time."

He described the knife that Kershaw used as "a murderous weapon".

The blackmail had been a "unpleasant and nasty" offence.

Kershaw had a bad record, said the judge.

He jailed Kershaw for 18 months, to be served after he finishes the four-year sentence he received for blackmail and assault at the same court in March 2020.

The blackmail was committed in August 2019 and the shop robbery on May 9, 2019.

For Kershaw, Glenn Parsons said his offending had been shaped by his childhood.

His mother had been a drug addict.

Since being sent behind bars, he had done his best to reform himself.

He had taken a drug rehabilitation course and done other rehabilitation work.

He was now free of drugs and wanted to try and take himself away from the criminal background in which he had lived since his early teens.

After the hearing, North Yorkshire Police revealed how the shop assistant's jacket had been crucial in bringing Kershaw to justice.

During the robbery, he had grabbed the victim's arm and jumped onto the counter before stealing the gin.

But he left traces of his DNA on the shop assistant's jacket and officers handed it for forensic examination.

Kershaw was also captured on the shop's CCTV, members of the public told police they had seen him leaving the store and police spotted him when he returned to the scene later the same day.

The blackmail offence was committed with 54-year-old Peter Anthony Egan, of York, who was jailed for three years and one month for the blackmail and carrying a bladed object in public.