A MAN who shone a laser at a police helicopter was today jailed for three months.

Teesside's top judge condemned Peter Ditchburn, 28, for his stupidity in flashing the green laser light at a police helicopter.

Teesside Crown Court heard the pilot, who was returning to his base at Durham Tees Valley Airport, was able to take evasive action.

Prosecutor Sue Jacobs said the officers on board the helicopter saw the green laser light hit the side of the aircraft before seconds later dazzling the crew in the cockpit.

Minutes after the incident, when police arrived at Ditchburn's house to arrest him, he told officers: "I just saw a bloke in the newspaper get serious time for doing the same thing."

Ditchburn tried to blame a friend for the incident but later confessed that he was responsible.

Mrs Jacobs added: "He accepted he was reckless and that he knew he lived under the flight path of the airport."

At an earlier hearing Ditchburn, of Darlington Road, Stockton, admitted one charge of endangering the safety of an aircraft on the evening of October 25, last year.

Peter Wishlade, mitigating, said Ditchburn was taking methadone as he battled a heroin addiction and at the time of the incident was struggling to come to terms with the death of his father "He is regrettable someone who is addicted to drugs. On the night of this incident he and his brother were reviewing pictures of their father on the computer."

Passing sentence, Judge Peter Fox, QC, The Recorder of Middlesbrough, praised the skill of the pilot in avoiding a tragedy.

"You have obviously read in the paper that you go to prison for doing what you did," the judge said. "Some people cannot learn.

"Why do you think gentlemen of the Press are here reporting these cases? So people like you will read about what you get when you do it.

"It beggars belief.

"This is the third or so case in the past year I have dealt with and it has to stop. People have go to know that you go to prison for doing it. It's highly dangerous."