A MAN enraged at unfounded rumours that he was a paedophile terrified a mum and her children with a gun.

Alan Millington, aged 60, of Oakfield Avenue, Atherton, pleaded guilty on Monday at Bolton Crown Court to possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence.

The court was told that last August, there was an argument in a pub when he was told that rumours were being spread about him. Millington set off to find his daughter, who he had not seen for many years and who he believed was behind the stories.

When he got to the street in Atherton where she lived, he spotted her neighbour Amanda Gill and asked her if she was Sue, his daughter. She directed him to the next house and saw him pick up and iron bar and hit the door with it.

The following day, Mrs Gill was in her garden with her children when Millington returned, pulled a pistol from his waistband, cocked it and pointed it at his daughter's door.

In a statement Mrs Gill said she was petrified and threw the children into her house.

When questioned by police, Millington told them the pistol, an airgun, had been loaded and he would have used it if necessary.

Sentencing Millington to six months in prison, suspended for two years, Judge Arthur Rumbelow said although the offence was serious he took into account the defendant's poor health.

"I do not consider you represent a high risk of further offending to the general community," he told Millington.

Richard Gray, defending, said Millington was an older man, regarded as a loner and as such was "a target for every beer swilling big mouth he comes across".

"There was really nothing worse than having an allegation of being a paedophile, quite unjustifiably, levelled against him," he added.