A MAN who kicked his 84-year-old grandmother and dragged her by the hair down the stairs has been jailed for 18 months.

Teesside Crown Court heard the kindly pensioner allowed Yasser Shah to live with her as she felt sorry for him.

Shah was given a community order last year by magistrates for the hair pulling incident and was subjected to a restraining order - meaning he could no longer live with his grandmother at her Middlesbrough home.

However, he continued living there, in breach of the order.

Prosecutor Shaun Dryden said that on January 10 this year Shah, whose family were in court to see him sentenced, travelled with his grandmother to visit a relative in Roseberry Park Hospital, Middlesbrough.

On their way back from the visit, Shah asked the victim for cash to buy cannabis. But when she refused he kicked her leg, causing her to fall to the ground.

Shah told the woman, who injured her forehead, that he would take her for medical treatment, but said she must not explain what had happened.

He was later arrested by police and admitted a section 47 assault and breaching the order.

The 19-year-old, of Marton Road, Middlesbrough, was said to have had a troubled upbringing. But Judge Sean Morris said this was no excuse for such behaviour.

He also said that tears Shah apparently shed were not for his grandmother, but “tears for himself”.

He extended the restraining order by four years and jailed the defendant for 18 months.