A SON whose lengthy campaign of vandalism and harassment has made his elderly parents' life a misery has been jailed for more than three years.

It is the second prison sentence Mark Robert Middleton has received in 18 months as he repeatedly defies court orders to leave his mother and father, both in their seventies, alone.

His mother told York Crown Court of the mental, emotional and financial strain she and her husband, are suffering at his hands.

"We don't feel safe in our home," she wrote in a letter to Judge Simon Hickey.

Middleton, 47, of no fixed address, denied three charges of breaching a restraining order but was convicted by York magistrates at a trial and sent to York Crown Court for sentence. He admitted assaulting an employee at the Peasholme Centre for the homeless in York.

He told the higher court he should be banned from Selby, the town where they live.

The judge said Middleton's behaviour to his parents, aged 70 and 75 was "appalling."

"You advance no reason why you keep doing it and you keep doing it despite a court order," he said.

"These particularly vulnerable members of the public are entitled to be protected from you and the only way I can make sure they are not bothered by you is to keep you away from them as long as I possibly can."

He passed a three-year prison sentence for the three breaches of the restraining order and added a month for the assault.

Brooke Morrison, prosecuting, said Middleton was banned indefinitely from contacting his parents and going to their home street among other conditions under a restraining order.

But for years he had harassed them, smashed their windows on more than one occasion and damaged their car.

Some of the offences were committed within hours of him being released from prison.

In 2020, he was jailed for 30 months at York Crown Court for breaching the restraining order.

In January and February this year he sent packages addressed to himself to his parents' home, on January 28, he left a message on their answer phone claiming to be someone else and telling them to send him some money.

On February 3, he phoned them again.

On February 28, without explanation he approached a staff member at Peasholme Centre for the homeless from behind. threatened to kill him and was so aggressive, the other man locked himself into an office until police arrived and arrested Middleton.

In court Middleton represented himself. He made accusations about the Peasholme Centre employee, then said: "I have got no problem with the man and no problems with the staff but I don't want to go to that place again.

"My mental health deteriorated, I don't get any help, any help whatsoever."