A MAN has been locked up for more than four years after robbing a Southampton amusement arcade and hurling racist abuse at a shopkeeper.

Benjamin Miles-Worsfold grabbed £1,500 from the owner of Moretons in Above Bar Street before punching and biting his victim as he fled the scene.

Two days later he shouted “disgraceful”

racist comments at the owner of a newsagent in Thornhill, Southampton Crown Court was told.

In the first offence, in December last year, the 22-year-old had been playing on a fruit machine with a friend when he noticed arcade owner Edwin Daschja emptying the contents of a change machine.

A shocked customer called police when she saw Miles-Worsfold, of Walnut Avenue, Southampton, grab the notes and grapple with Mr Daschja by the shop entrance.

Days later he was arrested by police and admitted to both the robbery and the separate charge of racially aggravated harassment.

In mitigation, the court heard how Miles-Worsfold, who had a history of convictions for theft, had been diagnosed with a behavioural disorder and that the robbery had not been premeditated.

But Judge Tom Longbotham said his actions had been “unpleasant and obnoxious” and jailed him for four years for the robbery and six months for the racially aggravated harassment to run consecutively.