A FORMER boxing champion pleaded with a court yesterday to send him to jail after he was convicted of a string of offences.

Terrence Rowley was locked up for seven months for crimes including assaulting a police officer and stealing T-shirts from a football stadium.

A promising amateur boxer, Rowley reached national finals five times as a youth, but a court heard that following family problems he became addicted to heroin.

The court heard that in April this year, Rowley and an accomplice hid in the offices of Hartlepool United Football Club after the close of business.

The pair made their way into the club's boardroom before stealing a quantity of football shirts from a storeroom. A caretaker, who saw the men, identified the accomplice, and Rowley was linked to the crime through fingerprint evidence.

Earlier in the same month, Rowley had thrown a beer can at a police officer called to deal with a disturbance outside the Victory Club, on Sandringham Road, Hartlepool.

When the officer went to arrest him, Rowley tried to attack the policeman.

The court was told that Rowley wanted to go to prison because his girlfriend was due to give birth in September and he hoped to be able to beat his addiction and start afresh.

Neil Taylor, mitigating, told the court: "There comes a time in your life when you have to say enough is enough. That time has come for my client. He wants a custodial sentence, he needs a period of detoxification. He seems to be acknowledging his responsibilities as a father."

The finest moment in his boxing career was in 1997 when he won the National Association of Boys Clubs Class C title in London.

Mr Taylor said: "He had an awful lot going for him and he has lost all that."

As well as the offences of burglary and assault, Rowley also pleaded guilty to further offences of criminal damage, theft, failure to surrender to bail, driving whilst disqualified and making off without offering payment.

Magistrate Janet Watson told him: "As has already been said today, enough is enough."