A dangerous offender who walked out of a Suffolk open prison after learning his ex-partner was seeing someone else, sent her a text while he was on the run threatening to “break every bone in her neck”, a court has heard.

Darren Hilling has been serving an indeterminate sentence with a minimum term of four years for stabbing and torturing a man at his Ipswich home when he escaped from Hollesley Bay, near Woodbridge last month, Ipswich Crown Court heard.

Charlotte Davidson, prosecuting, said Hilling had been told by his mother during a visit the day before the escape that his ex-partner was in a relationship with someone else.

The following morning a roll call was held at 8am and Hilling was reported as missing to the police.

While on the run 26-year-old Hilling had texted his partner who lives in Ipswich asking her what she had been up to and threatening to “break every bone in her neck”, said Miss Davidson.

When police visited her home in Orwell Heights while searching for Hilling she was tearful and shaking and said she was scared he would hurt her or kill himself or both, the court heard.

Hilling was arrested by police at around 9pm the day after his escape after he was seen running along a railway line near Europa Park in Ipswich, said Miss Davidson.

Hilling admitted escape from custody on September 14, unauthorised possession of a mobile phone in prison and sending his partner a threatening text message.

Jailing him for four months Judge David Goodin said Hilling had escaped from prison after receiving “unsettling” news about his partner.

Hilling apologised to the court for the offences and said he would not have harmed his former partner.

At their sentencing hearing at Ipswich Crown Court in 2011 for an offence of inflicting grievous bodily harm a judge described Hilling, of Wellington Street, Ipswich and accomplice Ricky Mutton, then 24, of Montgomery Road, Ipswich as dangerous.

The court heard they had left 56-year-old Colin Woods tied up and bleeding, with a potato stuffed in his mouth, at his flat in Bittern Close in March 2010.

During the attack Mr Wood was hit over the head with a champagne bottle and was stabbed several times.

He was left tied up in his bathroom and spent six days in hospital.

Hilling is the third person to escape from Hollesley Bay since August 20.