A HEROIN dealer described as having a dreadful criminal record has been jailed for two years and three months.

Anthony Ambrose Burton was arrested by police following a drugs raid at flats in Richmond, North Yorkshire.

Teesside Crown Court heard that the raid at flats in Temple Court, on May 15 this year, recovered 13 wraps of heroin, a rock of crack cocaine, an ounce of cannabis resin and drugs equipment.

Burton, 46, of Earl Edwin Drive, Richmond, admitted possession with intent to supply and two counts of possession.

Johnny Walker, prosecuting, said Burton told police he had been dealing heroin over the past three months.

He had previous offences for drugs offences and dishonesty and had received a six-year jail sentence in the mid-1990s for the supply of heroin.

Nick Towers, for Burton, who is now undergoing a 12-month drug rehabilitation programme, said he was supplying to friends to fund his own desperate addiction.

He said: "He bitterly regrets this latest lapse and professes gratitude that he was caught.

"He is pleased to be in prison and has now come off drugs."

After being sentenced, Burton told Judge Peter Fox that he was determined to remain clean.