A prolific criminal has been jailed for stabbing a teenager who mocked him for riding a child’s scooter.

Luke Bidgood, 19, flew into a rage as he was riding his scooter through Clifton in Salford when a 16-year-old boy asked him why ‘a grown man was riding a child’s toy’.

Furious Bidgood stabbed the youngster in the thigh.

Now he has been jailed for eight-and-a-half years after he admitted the attack and another stabbing two days before.

Prosecutor Peter Warne told Manchester Crown Court that the victim of the later incident had been with two friends on Whitegate Drive when they were approached by Bidgood and his co-defendant Jobe Jeffrey, 22, on February 5 last year.

The youngster then made the ‘disparaging remark about why grown men should be riding out with what were said to be toys’, Mr Warne told the court.

Jeffrey picked up his scooter and threw it at the youngster, prompting what the court heard was a fight between the three.

The 16-year-old boy got Jeffrey in a headlock but then Bidgood stabbed the youngster in the thigh.

The victim was taken to hospital for stitches and made a full recovery, although the court heard he was so traumatised by the incident he has left the area.

Police identified both defendants from CCTV footage and when officers eventually arrested Bidgood he was armed with a lock-knife and a large kitchen knife.

The investigation also established that Bidgood, who despite his years has a long criminal record which includes car crime, assault, and possessing offensive weapons, had stabbed a complete stranger two days earlier.

The victim on that occasion had just come out of a convenience store Clifton when Bidgood, who was with two others, asked him: “Have you got a problem with me?”

The man explained he was just going to the shops but Bidgood suddenly took out a knife and stabbed his fleeing victim twice, once in the buttock and also in the back.

CCTV was played in court which showed how Bidgood lunged at the man who then sought refuge in the shop from where he called police.

He went to hospital but the wounds healed themselves, the court heard.

The victim said the attack had left him ‘anxious about leaving the house’ and he was so traumatised he needed a month off work.

Bidgood, of Bancroft Road in Swinton, was jailed for eight-and-half years after he admitted GBH, wounding and two counts of possessing knives.

Judge Martin Rudland described knife crime as a ‘considerable threat’ to society and he told the defendant: “It’s a sadness to see a young man such as yourself having gone down the path you have gone down and ending up facing serious offences such as these.”

Sarah Johnston, defending, told the court her client had had a ‘difficult up-bringing’, and had been diagnosed with ADHD which was ‘never managed properly’.

“This man has never been a gang member but clearly associates with those who are and has been drawn into negative behaviour and particularly class A drugs. It’s resulted in paranoid behaviour and the carrying of knives in order to protect himself,” added Ms Johnston.

Jeffrey, of Wilfried Street, Salford, was handed a 16 month suspended prison sentence after he admitted assault.

The labourer, who wore a suit in the dock unlike his co-defendant, hadn’t known Bidgood was armed when he stabbed his second victim.

After hearing a glowing testimonial from his boss at a building firm, Judge Rudland told Jeffrey: “We are not in the business of destroying lives that don’t have to be destroyed.”