HABITUAL criminal Darren Bell, whose offending included taking a car so he could live in it, was given a chance to go straight yesterday when a court in Harrogate changed its mind about jailing him.

Bell, 25, who admitted a string of offences, was asked by presiding magistrate Mary Tennant why he thought an alternative to prison should be considered.

"You have a bad record. What we have in front of us is appalling. You are an habitual offender with the same crimes over and over again."

Bell said he had started his life of crime after falling in with a bad crowd and "getting into speed" without realising how it would take over his life.

"I was completely mixed up and did not know what I was thinking. In the last three weeks I have sorted my life out so much. I have had no speed for three weeks now and I am looking in the right direction. I don't want to be a waster, doing drugs all my life."

After hearing what Bell had to say, Mrs Tennant told him she and colleague Scilla Kealy had changed their minds over jail.

Instead, Bell was put on probation for a year, banned from driving for the same period and told to pay £120 costs.

He had pleaded guilty to theft, taking a vehicle without consent, four offences of driving without insurance and two of not having a licence, possession of drugs and two counts of failing to answer bail.

"This is your last opportunity," Mrs Tennant told him after his solicitor, David Camidge, confirmed he was a changed man. Mr Camidge said Bell, of Slingsby Crescent, Harrogate, had gone through a troubled period in his life with no job and no home. He had taken a Ford Escort he found abandoned just to give him a roof over his head.

A friend was now putting him up, he was seeing his 18-month-old daughter regularly and his father had promised him a labouring job.