A TEACHER jailed for confronting youths with a pellet gun after becoming the victim of a campaign of crime and anti-social behaviour has failed in her latest bid to clear her name.

Lord Justice Maurice Kay expressed sympathy for Linda Walker, 50, from Urmston, and said she had been driven "to the end of her tether".

But he said at the High Court in London that her continuing campaign to overturn her conviction for possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence, and affray, had no prospect of success.

The judge said: "We simply think this is a case you cannot win."

Mrs Walker, of Hollyhouse Drive, had suffered incidents including nuisance calls, a wing mirror broken off her son's car, her shed broken into, garden ornaments thrown over a wall and fish stolen from her pond.

The final provocation came in August 2004 when she saw that a washing-up liquid container full of water had been emptied over her son's car.

She was found guilty of the firearms offence and affray at Manchester Crown Court in March 2005 and received a total jail sentence of six months.

Her career as a teacher of children with behavioural problems was left in ruins by her conviction.

Later Mrs Walker said: "What has happened to me is totally devastating. I am a mother of three children, a teacher and a person who has tried to help people in my life.

"Now I am left with a criminal record while the youths who started all this have got away with it. They are fireproof while I am serving a life sentence."