A KNIFEMAN could be facing a prison sentence after threatening to cut the throat of a love rival.

Victor Jeffries was found guilty of making threats to kill and three counts of possession of a knife after a trial at Warrington Magistrates' Court on Friday, May 4.

The 58-year-old’s latest conviction puts him in breach of a nine-month suspended sentence imposed on him at Liverpool Crown Court in March for five counts of possession of a knife.

Warrington Magistrates' Court heard that on Monday, March 19, alcoholic Jeffries had bought a bottle of brandy and was walking around the town centre drinking it.

Shortly after 4pm, he made a phone call to his ex-partner Angela Kearns.

Jeffries, of Blackledge Close in Cinnamon Brow, left a voicemail message calling her a ‘b****’ before threatening to kill her former partner Colin Day.

The voicemail, which was played in court, said: “Where’s that ginger c***?

“I’m going to cut his throat - I’ve just bought a new knife and when I find him he’s dead.”

Ms Kearns told the court: “I was scared for Victor himself - I knew he wasn’t in the right frame of mind.

“I just thought if he saw Colin he would have done something with the knives or if somebody had tried to help him he would have hurt them.”

At around 5pm on the same day, Jeffries went to the Mega Bargain Store on Buttermarket Street in the town centre and purchased three knives.

Around 10 minutes later, he returned to the shop as he wanted to buy a backpack.

Jeffries had removed the knives from their packaging and placed them in his pocket, and a member of the public raised concerns about him to the shopkeeper.

They then removed Jeffries, who has a tattoo of a butterfly on his forehead, from the store and restrained him until the police arrived to arrest him.

The defendant claimed he had purchased the knives as he wanted to go home and make a salad, but his knives had been taken off him by the police following his previous conviction 10 days earlier.

But district judge David Scanlon found Jeffries guilty of the charges.

Jeffries was spared jail earlier this year, having brandished knives in the Barley Mow pub during an incident in February.

Judges could now opt to activate his suspended sentence in full and send him to prison.

Jeffries will be sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court next month.