A PLAIN clothes police sergeant was threatened with an axe after he called at a man's Burnley home over a police complaint, a jury heard.

Sgt Stephen Holgate was seen by colleagues backing down the garden path as Michael Bates, 27, held the axe above his head.

An officer, fearing the sergeant was about to be attacked, leapt over a fence and struck Bates with his baton after he refused to drop the axe, Burnley Crown Court heard.

Bates, of Harold Street, Burnley, denies making a threat to kill and affray.

He claimed he did not know it was a police officer and thought trouble had turned up at his door.

The court was told Sgt Holgate had been sent to the defendant's house to invite him to see senior officers, after Bates made a complaint.

Sgt Holgate was said to have held up his warrant card to the defendant at a window.

Questioned by June Morris, prosecuting, PC John Tyreman told the court he was in a parked vehicle and saw the sergeant knocking at the front door of a house in Harold Street.

The officer said he was about 20 feet away and could see a man standing in the light in the front bedroom.

The light then went out, the front door opened and a man was standing there holding an axe over his head.

PC Tyreman said he heard a raised voice and verbal threats and saw the sergeant back down the path towards the gate.

The officer said the defendant kept coming towards the sergeant with the axe and he got out of his vehicle, jumped over a fence and shouted to Bates to put the axe down.

The defendant didn't put it down so PC Tyreman said he struck him hard on the right leg with his baton.

The officer said Bates then dropped the axe and he and other officers took the defendant to the ground to control him and so he did not pick up the axe again.

PC Tyreman told the jury: "I was very, very concerned that Mr Bates was about to strike the sergeant.

"I was under no illusions that that was going to happen.

"I must admit I was frightened for my own safety but more frightened for the sergeant's."

PC Tyreman said after Bates was arrested, he was still very violent and struggling and the defendant told the officers: "It takes all you lot to sort me out."

John Sawyer, defending, suggested Bates was in the process of dropping the axe as PC Tyreman struck him.

The barrister suggested: "You came from the side and surprised him. Just as you were about to hit him, he dropped the axe at that point."

The officer: "No he definitely wasn't.

"

Mr Sawyer: "He came to the front door, took a couple of steps shouting 'Come on big boy'." The officer: "I never heard him shout that."

The barrister wenton: "You hit him from the side after he had only taken a couple of steps out of the front door." PC Tyreman: "No, I was facing him when I hit him."

Cross-examining another officer, PC Paul Gaynor, Mr Sawyer suggested: "When Sgt Holgate knocked on that door there was another person in that garden?" The officer said: "No, there wasn't.

"

(Proceeding)