A teenage thug has been jailed for 18 months for stabbing a public schoolboy with a screwdriver in a row over territory – just yards from where Ben Kinsella was murdered.

The 16-year-old victim sustained a punctured lung in the gang attack in North Road, Holloway, after the south London pupil and two school friends were targeted because they were not from the area.

The Old Bailey heard this week that they had been rehearsing for a play at the Pleasance Theatre before being approached on a bike by two 15-year-old boys and a 13-year-old boy from the Holloway area.

The budding actors told the gang to leave them alone but one of the 15-year-olds pulled out a blue-handled screwdriver.

One victim was repeatedly punched in the face and scratched on his back by the tool.

The others joined in and one threw a traffic cone before the 15-year-old lunged at the 16-year-old with the screwdriver, leaving him needing hospital treatment for a punctured lung. The gang then chased him as he escaped to the Tube.

Passing sentence, Judge Daniel Worsley described the behaviour of the screwdriver attacker, who admitted wounding with intent and affray, as “shocking.” He had previously been reprimanded for theft, going equipped and vehicle-taking.

He said: “You pressed the screwdriver into your victim’s chest, through the clothing, into his lung.

“It is very lucky for you that you didn’t kill or permanently harm him.”

The court heard that he has since moved away with his family and Judge Worsley said references suggest he “can be a decent young man.”

The other defendants admitted affray. The 15-year-old was given 12 months’ youth rehabilitation and the youngest defendant, who is now 14, will be sentenced at a later date.

Ben Kinsella was fatally stabbed in North Road in 2008.