A thug who hurled racist abuse during violence while armed with a pair of scissors has been jailed for a year.

Adam Burnett had been in custody on remand for three months, and will only have to serve another three months before he is due for release.

Two others involved in the street fracas were spared immediate imprisonment.

Lee Davenport and Abiodun Ojofeitimi were each sentenced to four months suspended for 18 months and ordered to do 180 hours unpaid work.

Burnett, of Richmond Road, Gillingham, Davenport, of Burnt Oak Terrace, Gillingham, and Ojofeitimi, of Station Road, Hampton, London, all denied affray, but were convicted in September.

Burnett also denied having a blade, but was convicted. Ojofeitimi denied assault causing actual bodily harm and was acquitted of that charge.

Maidstone Crown Court heard two police officers were in Canterbury Street in Gillingham shortly after midnight on October 22, last year, when they heard people running and a crash like breaking glass.

As they reached Windmill Road they saw Davenport, 44, and Ojofeitimi, 29, “swinging punches at each other”.

Prosecutor Jonathan Rosen said the officers tried to separate them but they kept surging towards each other. Adam Burnett, 33, was racially abusing Ojofeitimi and others and threatening: “I am going to kill you.”

A window of one of the houses was smashed.

Mr Rosen said Davenport and his wife Hayley had been out for the evening, drinking in the nearby Westcourt Arms pub.

Others were sitting on a wall drinking and an argument started. It riled Burnett, who picked up and threw a recycling bin.

He went back into the house before coming out again with scissors and using racist language with threats.

Ojofeitimi inflicted a cut to Hayley Davenport’s hand which severed a tendon near her thumb and she needed surgery.

Burnett was sentenced to eight months for affray, three months for breaching a suspended sentence and one month for failing to attend on the last day of the trial, all to run consecutively.

He was given two months to run concurrently for the blade offence.

• This story has been amended. Previously it stated that Burnett had thrown the bin towards Hayley Davenport, which was incorrect. We're happy to correct this matter.