A TEENAGER broke into an Oxford primary school and stole £5,500 worth of equipment including laptop computers and digital cameras.

Oxford Crown Court heard Alan Hathaway, 18, and two friends smashed windows at the back of St Gregory the Great School in Cricket Road last August.

Hathaway, of Weyman Terrace, Cowley, also asked the court to take into account 13 other offences of theft and burglary.

Jennifer Edwards, prosecuting, said the break-in, together with two later burglaries at the same school, resulted in £18,000 of damage.

Hathaway was caught after police found his fingerprints at the scene.

He admitted the burglary and also admitted one charge of affray after a disturbance outside his former home in Leys Place, East Oxford, last September.

The court heard a petrol bomb was thrown at a car during the incident - although John Simmons, defending, said Hathaway had not thrown it.

Mr Simmons said Hathaway had had a traumatic childhood.

He told the court Hathaway had been on suicide watch while on remand and suffered from a personality disorder.

Mr Recorder Edward Jenkins handed Hathaway a 51-week jail sentence, suspended for two years, and a two-year supervision order.