A JEALOUS boyfriend attacked a man with a bike chain when he saw him with his estranged partner in the street.

The pair were walking home from a night at the bingo when angry Shaun Priest struck in Stockton in March.

Two weeks earlier, Priest and the woman had split up and he had been following her around, a court heard.

When he saw the pair, he shouted "you're going to get it", prosecutor David Crook told Teesside Crown Court.

Priest, 32, swung the chain - which had a padlock on the end - and struck the man across the back of the head.

Andrew White, mitigating, said it was "a chance encounter" and Priest had the security chain for a legitimate reason.

"He saw them together and it did make him feel jealous," said Mr White. "He acted impulsively and is sorry."

The court heard that since the incident, Priest, of Hartington Road, Stockton, and the woman had reconciled.

Priest admitted assault and possessing an offensive weapon, and was given an 18-month community order.

He was given 18 months of supervision, 40 hours of unpaid work and was told to pay his victim £75 compensation.

The judge, Recorder Sarah Mallett, told unemployed Priest: "The only injury he suffered was a headache.

"That was really very fortunate because what you used as a weapon could have caused him much greater harm."