Worried passers-by immediately alerted police as the October 13 incident was unfolding but it turned out to be something of a false alarm.
Hira Begley, 18, was using a retractable toy knife and was play-fighting with a friend.
However, when police searched him they found a real knife tucked into the waistband of his pants, the Dunedin District Court heard last week.
‘‘You may have thought that play-fighting in public was funny, but you were wrong,’’ Judge Hermann Retzlaff said.
‘‘There’s nothing funny about that and members of the public, particularly in the city area, had concerns about that kind of behaviour.’’
The incident came 17 months after schoolboy Enere McLaren-Taana was fatally stabbed by a 13-year-old at the bus hub and happened just days before that case was due to come before the Court of Appeal.
Begley was also on bail at the time, the court heard.
Early on August 17, he was spotted by police trying to start a fight in the Octagon.
When they asked the defendant to leave the area, he instead rushed again at the subject of his animosity and verbally abused officers as they ushered him away from the confrontation.
As they tried to handcuff him, Begley used his legs to push off nearby cars and they eventually had to carry him to a patrol vehicle to effect the arrest.
While being processed at the station, Begley spat in the face of an officer.
In his shoulder bag, police found a craft knife, court documents said.
The presence of weapons on both occasions was worrying, Judge Retzlaff said, noting the defendant had no previous convictions.
Counsel Andy Belcher said his client had been struggling at the time with a lack of support from his parents.
‘‘When I first met him he was something of a self-entitled young man ... he has made a big big turnaround,’’ Mr Belcher said.
The court heard Begley now had the backing of extended family and was engaged with training designed at getting him into work.
The judge told Begley he should focus on that, rather than the alcohol and negative associates which had led him before the court.
Begley — who was convicted of two counts of possessing a weapon, two of disorderly behaviour, resisting and assaulting police — was sentenced to two months’ community detention and 12 months’ intensive supervision.
Judge Retzlaff made an order for destruction of the knives.
