A MAN who threatened to burn down a couple’s flat and throw acid in the face of a two-year-old girl had his custodial sentence extended by 28 months.

David O'Dwyer, 27, told takeaway worker Anthony Jones-Hughes, 33, he would set him alight and threatened his partner Katie Gravenor after a row over a car insurance, a court heard.

During one phonecall, he told Ms Gravenor he would pour acid into the face of a two-year-old girl, Cardiff Crown Court heard.

The harassment campaign left them so frightened they left their flat Tredegar and moved to London, Crown prosecutor Peter Davies told the court.

The jailed robber appeared in custody before a judge on Friday [September 6] after pleading guilty to harassing the couple.

O’Dwyer, of Oliver Jones Crescent, Tredegar, also admitting punching an off-licence worker in the town in an unrelated incident on March 31 this year.

Judge Philip Richards increased the 26-month prison term he is currently serving by a further 28 months.

Judge Richards also imposed a restraining order stopping him from contacting the couple or going anywhere within 100 metres of their home for 10 years.

The judge told the court it must have been “terribly worrying” for the couple to have been subjected to the “fierce verbal attacks”.

O’Dwyer’s barrister, Chris Smyth, said an incident in which his client was glassed in 2009 had led him on a “downward spiral” of crime, though he had pledged to address his offending behaviour.

Judge Richards told him: “You are service a lengthy sentence of imprisonment. You need to make a fresh start.”

The court heard how O’Dwyer was jailed for a total of 26 months for robbery, assault and cannabis production in May this year.

On Friday, Judge Richards gave O’Dwyer another two-year custodial sentence after he pleaded guilty to harassing the couple between October 2012 and January 2013.

He also received a four-month sentence, to run consecutively, after pleading guilty to one count of common assault against a worker at Bargain Booze in Commercial Street, Tredegar.

He also ordered O’Dwyer to pay a £100 surcharge.

Judge Richards directed that a plea of not guilty be entered in relation to a charge of aggravated common assault against the shop worker after the Crown Prosecution Service offered no evidence.