Four years for drug dealer caught with heroin

A British Transport Police officer tracked Howard Winston Collinge, 37, to the South Yorkshire town by rail, Judge Jim Spencer QC said.

He lost him at Doncaster Station. But when the policeman decided to return to York, Collinge caught the same train and was arrested on the platform at York Station carrying 55.8g of heroin in a sleeve pocket and £530 in cash.

"You have been involved with drugs for many years and you are now in a situation where you are a drug supplier," the judge told Collinge. "I have absolutely no doubt that you went from York to Doncaster to obtain supplies of heroin so it could be distributed in York."

He jailed Collinge, of Front Street, Acomb, for four years. The self-confessed drug addict admitted possessing heroin with intent, but claimed that he was only looking after it for another person.

Giving evidence at York Crown Court, he alleged that the drug's owner had paid him £200 and given him some heroin of his own if he kept the 55g of the drug safe and returned it to him later on.

He claimed that the £530 found on him when he was arrested on October 17 was partly benefit money, partly winnings from horse betting and partly the £200, and that he intended to go to a bookmaker's on his return to York. He added that he took the heroin with him to keep it safe when he went to Doncaster to exchange articles of clothing he had bought there on an earlier visit.

But the judge rejected his account. "I don't accept a word of what he says. He is dishonest and the reason he is dishonest in this context is that he wants to try and mitigate his position so far as sentence is concerned."

The judge said that Collinge was towards the end of the drug supply chain.

Collinge's barrister, Simon Reevell, said his client's girlfriend was expecting a child within three months, and the couple had planned to move house together next week.

- The current street value of heroin is estimated at about £10 a wrap, or dose.

Updated: 10:56 Friday, June 06, 2003