A WOMAN who made threats to blow up a special school and later drove towards children on a pavement has been spared jail after a judge heard she has started a new life in Scotland and is making efforts to change her life.

Bolton Crown Court had previously heard how 29-year-old Charlotte Wallace blamed Birtenshaw Special School, in part, for her children being taken off her and contacted Cllr Adele Warren with a series of email rants.

But police became involved when Wallace sent another email, on December 7 last year stating: “I promise now, if I don’t get my two children back, there will be a mass number of parents collecting bodies of theirs. I will blow the f***ing school and CEO up. Try me.”

Neil Ronan, prosecuting, said the following month, Wallace also vented her anger at a neighbour Levi Cracknell, who she was involved in a long-standing dispute with, by driving a car at her and her children as they walked along the pavement on their way to school.

On January 25 Ms Cracknell and a friend were walking their six children, aged between two and eight, to school on Blair Lane when they saw Wallace driving her Motability-funded Mini.

"The complainant noticed the defendant in a dark Mini Cooper, driving towards them," said Mr Ronan.

“She ploughed onto the path and [Ms Cracknell] felt she was aiming towards her two-year-old son in the pram, so she rammed the pram to the right to move it out of the way and also get two children out of the way."

The vehicle, driven by Wallace, who had her 10-year-old brother in the passenger seat, stopped on the pavement, centimetres away from the family.

Mr Ronan added that Ms Cracknell noticed Wallace " had a massive grin on her face as she was doing this. Her brother, in the same car, looked terrified."

Wallace, formerly of Waggon Road, Bolton and now living in Fintry Crescent, Dundee, pleaded guilty to making a malicious communication, dangerous driving, attempted assault, and assault.

The court previously heard defence mitigation that Wallace, who suffers from fibromyalgia and a back injury, had intended to scare her victim, not to hurt anyone.

In July Judge Timothy Stead deferred sentencing Wallace until this month to give her time to meet a number of conditions including giving up up the tenancy on her Waggon Road home, handing back her Motability funded car, not committing any further offences, not contacting her victims and providing medical evidence that she is unfit to work.

Paul Treble, defending, told Judge Stead that Wallace has complied with the orders and has now largely severed her links with Bolton.

Sentencing her to 10 months in prison,suspended for two years, Judge Stead commented that Wallace is not someone who copes well with life's pressures.

He told her: "You have done all that I asked of you in the few months since you were last here.

"I am sure you know, when it says in reports that you are someone who cannot regulate their emotions, that is exactly it. That is the heart of your problem and you are going to have to work on it for the sake of all your family as well as yourself."

In addition to the suspended sentence, Judge Stead ordered that Wallace be subject to supervision for two years and participate in a mentoring for women programme.

A restraining order was made banning her from contacting her victims and she was banned from driving for a year after which she must taken an extended driving test.