AN irate hotel guest who went on a drug-fuelled wrecking spree after being woken by a fire alarm convinced magistrates he will put plans to move to Paris on ice long enough to complete the unpaid work they handed him.

Hussein Karimi was forced to check into the Dragonfly Hotel in Ardleigh in November along with his ex-partner and their child after his car broke down nearby.

The fire alarm went off at 3.30am and Karimi began destroying fixtures and fittings in his room with his anger at being woken up exaggerated by the drugs he had taken.

He also punched and kicked picture frames in the hallway and smacked a fire door while shouting and screaming swear words.

Staff were worried about the way the 30-year-old was behaving and called the police.

He then approached the person who made the call in an aggressive manner forcing her colleagues to step between them.

She told police she feared for her safety had they not been there.

Karimi admitted criminal damage immediately but denied a charge of threatening behaviour.

However he failed to show at a scheduled trial and was found guilty in his absence.

Ahead of his sentencing at Colchester Magistrates' Court, he told the probation service his actions had been because of the drugs he had taken and insisted he now only uses cannabis.

Mark Pearson, mitigating said Karimi had recently returned from Paris where he was hopeful of returning and securing a job in a restaurant but would stay in the country if ordered to do so by magistrates.

He said: "The job is not totally secured but he hopes it will be if he goes back but he tells me if he is given a court order then he is going to comply.

"He has given me assurance he will put his plans on hold if he has to do unpaid work, finish it and take time to consider what he wants to do."

Magistrates had suggested giving Karimi a curfew but were told he usually sleeps in his car and is only based at his given address in St Johns' Road, Tunbridge Wells, for brief periods.

They then decided to give him 130 hours of unpaid work over the next year.

He must pay £660 costs and £85 victim surcharge.