Hartlepool man threatened noisy neighbour with sawn-off shotgun and yelled: "I'm going to kill you."

James Richardson had "reached the end of his tether" with the way his block of flats had deteriorated over the years since he moved in.

The angry grandfather, 45, was due to go to a family funeral the day after a new neighbour threw a party for friends in May last year.

On the morning, he confronted Jordan Atkinson in a communal hall, headbutted him and knocked him to the floor with a barrage of punches.

Closed-circuit television footage from Titan House in Hartlepool shows Richardson continue the assault while his victim lay helpless.

After the confrontation, they went back to their flats, but Mr Atkinson went with friends to knock on his neighbour's door, a court heard.

Richardson came out with the double-barrelled gun - described by a judge as "murderous-looking" - and waved it about while making threats.

Defence barrister Mark Styles pleaded with Judge Sean Morris to spare Richardson prison, but he was told: "It's far too serious for that."

Judge Morris said: "Anybody who who possesses that kind of shocking weapon cannot expect to walk out of court - out of the question."

Teesside Crown Court heard how the cameras also caught Richardson leaving the flats in York Road with something hidden under his jacket.

He told police after his arrest that he did not have a gun, and what he had been waving about was a length of wood - part of a door frame.

But weeks later, a member of the public found the weapon in a bag, hidden under a tree at a woodland park on the outskirts of town.

Rocks were put next to it, suggesting the spot was marked so Richardson could go back and get it later, said prosecutor Shaun Dryden.

He denied the matter right up to trial, when he learned his DNA was on the gun, and a deactivation certificate for it was found in his flat.

Jailing him for 18 months, Judge Morris said: "What you had in your room is a murderous-looking weapon. It is an armed blagger's tool.

"It is the weapon of choice for those who want to instil in people maximum fear. It is horrendous-looking. You had it. Heaven knows why.

"Just imagine if that gun was out there now and falls into the wrong hands. It would be used in crime, pointed at the face of a shop owner."

He added: "You live in a communal property with people a lot younger who were habitually making a racket. I can understand your frustration.

"All sympathy for you goes out of the window when you play the system by denying it, lying, because the system comes back to bite you."

Mr Styles said Richardson, who admitted assault and possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence, "simply snapped".

He added: "He describes how things had deteriorated in standards in the block in the preceding two years. He had been there for eight years.

"Things had got worse and worse and there was a complete derogation of any responsibility from the local authority and housing group."