Mum caught shoplifting twice after she let house be used for selling drugs
A DERBY mum-of-two who allowed dealers to use her home to sell drugs has twice been caught shoplifting.
Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court heard how “heavy drug user” Sabrina James entered Sharif and Sons, in Pear Tree Road, on July 27 and took some red chilli and coconut.
Then, on August 13, the 33-yearold walked into Sainsbury’s, at Kingsway, and left having failed to pay for £117 of items.
On both occasions James was spotted and stopped before police were called to arrest her.
And both offences were committed just weeks after she had been spared prison for letting a drugs gang use her Rutland Street address as a shop from which to sell crack cocaine and heroin to users in the city.
Handing James a 12-week jail sentence, suspended for a year, District Judge Andrew Meachin said: “You have pushed yourself to the verge of prison, you have already been given a warning when you appeared at Derby Crown Court.”
In July, at the higher court, James pleaded guilty to allowing her premises to be allowed for selling drugs and was handed an 18-month community order with 35 rehabilitation sessions with the probation service.
That hearing was told how police executed a warrant at her address in October of last year. Inside was James and young street dealers Owen Duncan and Tyler Brant who Derby Crown Court was told were very much at the bottom of the chain of the gang. Sentencing the trio, Judge Shaun Smith QC said: “Miss
James, you allowed your premises to be used, you were used by others because you were a user yourself and there is the irony.”
Brant, 20, of Glaisdale Close, Beaumont Leys, Leicester, pleaded guilty to possession with intent to supply heroin and crack cocaine. He was sent to a young offenders’ institution for two years, suspended for 18 months, with 20 rehabilitation sessions and 100 hours of unpaid work.
Duncan, 20, of Osmaston Road, also pleaded guilty to possession with intent to supply heroin and crack cocaine. He, too, was sent to a young offenders’ institution for two years, suspended for 18 months, with 20 rehabilitation sessions and 150 hours of unpaid work.
You have pushed yourself to the verge of prison, you have already been given a warning. District Judge Andrew Meachin