A CRACK cocaine addict set fire to his mother’s home in an apparent suicide bid, a court heard.

Martin French phoned his mother after starting the blaze and said: “The house is on fire. It is the end for me, that is it.”

Firefighters who went to the property in Hartlepool discovered various items had been set alight in a kitchen with white spirit and nail varnish used as accelerants.

Police arrested French, who was agitated and under the influence of drugs and had also suffered a facial injury.

His mother said the kitchen would need replacing at a cost of several thousand pounds.

But in a statement read out at Teesside Crown Court, she said the damage was to material things and it was her son that was her main concern.

She said: “I am desperately worried about him, he needs help and medical treatment.”

Prosecutor Jenny Haigh said French was living with his mother while he was in a relationship with another woman.

But the relationship was fraught and the pair, both drug users, frequently argued.

French, 29, of Fieldfare Road, Hartlepool, admitted arson in November last year.

Stephen Constantine, mitigating, said the defendant’s life had been blighted by drugs, apparently since the age of ten.

He said: “Rather than wanting to harm people, it was an attempt to take his own life.

“He acted out of desperate circumstances brought about by his addiction.”

Judge Stephen Ashurst said French, who was now pledging to stay off drugs, needed to tackle his addiction and any sentence needed to contain a “carrot and stick” element.

He gave French a 15 month jail sentence, suspended for two years, and a 12 month drug rehabilitation order.