AN EX-SOLDIER who pushed paramedics away from a patient believed to have a "very serious head injury" has appeared in court.

Jessica Lister, prosecuting, said Andrew Roberts was so obstructive and was so unpleasant towards medical staff at York Hospital, security staff had to be called to get him out of the casualty department cubicle where the patient was being treated.

At one point, he told a paramedic: "You're the type of people who would get stabbed."

He denied he meant it as a threat.

"Other people, not just staff but patients as well would have been scared by what was going on and how loud he was being," said Ms Lister.

Roberts had drunk eight to 10 pints since arriving in York around midday.

He told a probation officer the patient was his father-in-law with whom he was visiting the city, and he didn't want to leave him.

Afghanistan veteran and building foreman Roberts, 30, of Ford Lane, Roxton, between Bedford and St Neots, pleaded guilty to obstructing paramedics at the Cross Keys pub in Goodramgate and two charges of threatening behaviour towards medical staff.

He was given a 12-month community order with a 20-week nightly curfew between 7pm and 4am, and 200 hours' unpaid work.

He was also ordered to pay £200 compensation each to the two medical staff he most offended, £85 prosecution costs and a £90 statutory surcharge.

Ms Lister said the ambulance crew were called out to the Cross Keys on November 17 to help a patient assessed as having a "very serious head injury".

Roberts got so much in their way, pushing them away from his father-in-law, that to defuse the situation, they allowed him to go in the ambulance to York Hospital.

In Accident and Emergency, he was again obstructive and aggressive before eventually leaving.

He told police he had been panicking in the ambulance because of how much his father-in-law was bleeding.

For him, Keith Whitehouse said he was full of remorse and handed in a letter on Roberts' behalf from the father-in-law.