A JUDGE criticised for not sending a drug dealer to prison locked up an addict for three years yesterday.

Judge Guy Whitburn decided to jail Colin Clark after Teesside Crown Court heard that the 24-year-old was found with two 30g bags of heroin, with a street value of £4,000, when a car he was travelling in was stopped by police.

Clark told police he was a heroin addict and had been holding the drugs for dealers who had promised to give him money and drugs.

Last week, Judge Whitburn was criticised by anti-drugs campaigners and politicians for sparing Thomas Scarth, 19, from custody because he said jails were too full.

Scarth, of Redcar, east Cleveland, admitted possessing 80 wraps of heroin with intent to supply, and received a 12-month suspended sentence.

Yesterday, the court heard Clark was seen by officers in a Vauxhall Astra last September 20. The car was stopped but Clarke ran to his girlfriend's house, in Borrowdale Street, Hartlepool.

He was pursued by an officer and was found in the bathroom trying to flush two bags of drugs down the toilet.

Paul Cleasby, defending, said Clark, of Borrowdale Street, Hartlepool, was under a lot of pressure from drug dealers to commit the crime.

Judge Whitburn said Clark had a bad criminal record, which included terms of imprisonment for burglary.

He said: "You knew exactly what you were doing and you were handling a considerable quantity of this drug."