A TEENAGE mugger will give birth behind bars after a crime spree in Huddersfield.

The pregnant teenager is starting a three-and-a-half year sentence in a young offenders’ institution after she was involved in a spate of robbery offences last year.

Christina O’Connor, who is due to give birth to her child in May, was sentenced yesterday by a judge.

Her barrister Gillian Batts said O’Connor had started truanting and hanging round Huddersfield town centre with older and more streetwise people after she was bullied severely at school when she was 13.

In January last year the teenager, now aged 19, was involved in a street robbery and Miss Batts said her client had carried on committing offences, drinking and taking drugs.

Bradford Crown Court heard yesterday how O’Connor, of North Street, Paddock, went on to commit another street robbery along with a 17-year-old female accomplice, who cannot be identified for legal reasons.

During that incident the duo armed themselves with kitchen knives and took a woman’s handbag and contents.

The following month O’Connor was involved in a robbery scam during which two young women were lulled into getting into a car believing it was a taxi and then property was taken from them.

O’Connor and her female accomplice also committed a burglary at an unoccupied house and the 19-year-old even assaulted her own mother.

Miss Batts said the attack on her mother had brought home to O’Connor the depths to which she had plummeted and she had taken steps to address her alcohol and drug problems.

She said O’Connor had the support of her mother and older sister and was now living independently.

“She has managed to stop drinking and taking drugs altogether,” added Miss Batts.

O’Connor admitted a series of charges including robbery, burglary and assault.

Yesterday Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC imposed the custodial sentence for what he said was properly described as a catalogue of serious offending.

Her 17-year-old accomplice also admitted robbery and burglary matters and was made the subject of a two-year detention and training order.