A YORK teenager was today starting three years in jail for his part in "every householder's nightmare".

Martyn Bell, 19, broke into a house in Sutherland Street, South Bank at 4am with an accomplice, said Helen Holmes, prosecuting.

But their noise downstairs awoke the tenant upstairs who went down and caught Bell red-handed. The second man escaped.

"It is every householder's nightmare to hear a noise in the house and find two men downstairs," said Judge Peter Charlesworth.

He jailed Bell for three years, plus a month for an unrelated theft.

Bell, no fixed address, admitted burglary. He had been given a conditional discharge for the theft a few weeks before the break-in. Miss Holmes said the tenant kept Bell on the living room sofa while his housemate called the police.

The burglars had put a DVD player, several DVDs and seven bottles of spirits in a bag on the floor and Bell had a Walkman in his pocket stolen from the house.

He told police he had gone into the house to "check it" because it was "insecure". Bell has previous convictions for burglary and has served four other jail terms in the last two years.

For Bell, Chris Tehrani said he had been led astray by older, more experienced offenders.

His mother had disowned him because he abused alcohol and drugs.

In the hours before the burglary, he had been drinking heavily because he had seen his mother and she had not recognised him.

He planned to tackle his heroin and alcohol problems so that he could be reconciled with his family.

Updated: 12:04 Saturday, December 15, 2001