A 27-year-old man with a long list of convictions for assault was sent to prison for nine months yesterday after admitting that he spat on a woman and threatened her with a helmet.

Eli Hill, of Smith's Avenue, Warwick, pleaded for leniency from Magistrate Edward King, and said he could pay a fine in the next few weeks, if given time.

But Mr. King said he would give Hill time - however not the sort he wanted.

He gave him three months for common assault, three months for threatening behaviour, and three months for breaching a suspended sentence imposed last year. Each of the sentences is to run consecutively, meaning the construction worker was sent to prison for a total of nine months.

Prosecutor Graveney Banister told the court that Hill had been walking along Cedar Avenue in Pembroke in July of last year when he began to push a woman about her arm as she walked passed him with her friend.

The court heard that the woman asked Hill why he had done it.

"The defendant looked at the complainant with disgust and proceeded to spit in her face," said Mr. Bannister.

The two of them began to argue about the incident, and then Hill is said to have raised a bike helmet in the air, as though about to hit her with it.

The prosecutor added: "He did this repeatedly. Each time the complainant backed away out of his reach. The defendant then walked away leaving the complainant and witness upset and in disbelief."

Hill, who at first pleaded not guilty to the charges but changed his plea yesterday when he was to go to trial, told the court he had simply bumped into the woman.

And he claimed that some time after the incident, the woman had turned up with some male friends, who had beaten him up, cracking a stereo over his head, damaging a tooth, and repeatedly kicking him in the face. Hill said: "I have not been in trouble all last year, except for this incident. I'm trying to pull myself out of this trouble. I go to work everyday trying to maintain it.

"I'm trying to get help. I have been on a bad road, but I'm trying to get help."

Hill said he had apologised to the woman, who was in court yesterday, and said he could pay $1,500 off a fine immediately, with the rest following in a few weeks.

He said he first bumped into the woman accidentally, but then became angry with her because she was saying bad things to him. "I was upset because they were not saying nice things to me. She was being nasty. She was calling me black this and black that."

Throughout his mitigation, the victim, who was also black, sat at the back of the court and shook her head. And Mr. King said he had heard enough. He said Hill had been trouble with the courts on numerous occasions, primarily for assault and stealing, and had been previously jailed for two years. The magistrate said: "You go and spit in her face - what for? Pick your own fight with people that can fight you. Not a defenceless woman."

Mr. King said he had taken into account the guilty pleas, but could not overlook Hill's "appalling record."