A thug has been jailed for 17 months after assaulting his ex-girlfriend and sending her thousands of threatening texts and phone calls.

Charlie Brooker, of no fixed address, appeared at Maidstone Crown Court today and pleaded guilty to making threats to kill his victim Tracey Latter, and to assaulting her.

The 26-year-old attacked Ms Latter in May after forcing her to drive him around aimlessly and shouting abuse at her.

"Brooker is a danger to women and belongs behind bars where he can cause them no harm and where they are free from his barrage of abuse..." - DC Becky Saunders

But Recorder Jason Dunn-Shaw angrily rounded on Charlie Brooker, 26, and Tracey Latter after hearing the history of the case involving the victim making retraction statements.

“The relationship with the lady of these proceedings is dismal and depressing,” he said.

“The court has spent two days in what might have been a trial and previous hearings doing what on one point of view was washing their dirty linen in public, wasting police time with an allegation she seeks to withdraw.”

Recorder Dunn-Shaw said the public was concerned that the Crown Prosecution Service gave its attention to true victims of domestic violence.

Other cases, he said, had to take a back seat while “vanities have been flaunted” in a “revolting display”.

Despite admitting common assault and making a threat to kill, Brooker denied stalking, blackmail and kidnap and no evidence was offered on the charges.

Prosecutor Vivian Walters said Miss Latter, now known as Cross, made a complaint to the police in April this year that Brooker - who has 44 convictions for 96 offences - had assaulted her.

He was arrested and held in custody. He was bailed on May 16 and then contacted Miss Cross, from Maidstone, telling her he had been evicted from his home.

She drove him around looking for somewhere for him to live and gave him money.

The assault happened at a shop in Crayford the next day. He took her keys and drove off.

Miss Walters said there was a series of phone calls and texts when Brooker was released from custody.

They were so vast - police said there were about 5,000 pages of texts - the phone could not store all of them.

Miss Cross sent him a text saying: “I will end up dead or in hospital.” Brooker told her: “I will kill you and your son.”

When arrested, he bragged that the case would “never get to court”. A police interview had to be stopped because he threatened an officer.

Miss Walters said Brooker’s long list of convictions included assaulting the mother of his child, Rebecca Longhurst.

Recorder Dunn-Shaw told him: “The threats to kill might have been taken seriously by Miss Cross despite what she says. I am not sure what she is saying at the moment.”

Brooker – who also threatened to headbutt a female police officer while in custody – was in breach of yet another court order involving a harassment offence.

The eight-month sentence was activated in full. Brooker was sentenced to a further six months for the threat to kill and three months for assault.

The exasperated judge added: “I will now get on with some serious work.”

After sentencing, Detective Constable Becky Saunders said: "Brooker is a violent offender with 44 previous convictions, most of which in recent years are for violence and harassment.

"He was in breach of a suspended sentence when committing these most recent offences and therefore now serves this term.

"Brooker is a danger to women and belongs behind bars where he can cause them no harm and where they are free from his barrage of abuse."