A GARDENER who threatened to throw a 12-year-old girl off a bridge and attacked children on their way to school has avoided a jail sentence.

Alan Wilson was furious that the girl and her two friends had been on a bit of disused land that he had regarded as his for 15 years, a jury heard.

He called the three friends "horrible evil creatures", grabbed the 12-year-old by the arm and hoisted her by her jeans on to the bridge parapet, saying: "I am so angry, I could kill you."

The jury at York Crown Court took 30 minutes to convict him of assaulting the girl. On the judge's direction, they acquitted him of affray.

Then Robin Frieze, prosecuting, said that on another occasion and without warning, he had grabbed two young girls he did not know who were on their way to school through Kirkbymoorside.

When they broke free, he kicked one of them.

"It is time you learned to keep your hands to yourself and behave yourself, " Judge Jim Spencer QC told him. "Many times you have told us you were 68. You should know better."

Giving him a 12-month conditional discharge for the bridge assault, the judge warned: "If you come back here for this sort of misconduct and outrageous behaviour, terrorising youngsters as you did, you will be dealt with much more severely."

The judge told the jury he was thinking of the future and hoped that the experience of standing trial was so unpleasant it would serve as a deterrent.

During the trial, Wilson, of West Lund Lane, Kirkbymoorside, denied assault and represented himself.

He claimed a disused railway cutting next to his house was his, and that he had worked for 15 years developing it as a nature reserve. The jury heard evidence that Micro-Metalsmiths Ltd, of Kirkbymoorside, have deeds showing that the land belongs to the company.

Wilson told the court that on October 15 he saw some girls in the cutting, waving one of his saplings.

He went out and took one by the arm. He denied dragging her to his house, then to the bridge and hoisting her onto the parapet.

He denied making the girls cry by frightening them and said they were "chatting".

In July, Scarborough magistrates ordered Wilson to do 80 hours' unpaid work for the two assaults on the girls as they were going to school.