A DEALER told the police “you’ve caught me red handed” after officers found him carrying cash from a drugs sale.
Shaun Kinghorn has been jailed for more than two years after police saw him dealing Class A drugs in Clacton in August 2020.
Chelmsford Crown Court heard officers swooped in on the 35-year-old and found him holding £20 from a sale he had just made.
Mark Mullins, prosecuting, said during a search Kinghorn “was found carrying drugs and a small, self-sealed bag in his socks”.
Kinghorn told officers he was selling the drugs to pay off his own debts and admitted: “You’ve caught me red handed”.
During the arrest, the police’s suspicions were raised when a man was seen “peering out the window” of Kinghorn’s home in Pallister Road.
Officers searched the property and found scales and a handwritten note with phone numbers for “light and dark” drug customers - for cocaine and heroin.
They also discovered 13 wraps of cocaine and 11 of a “brown powder” which has not yet been tested.
Mr Mullins said the prosecution agree Kinghorn “was engaged by pressure, coercion, intimidation or control”.
Kinghorn, who appeared at court via video link from Norwich Prison, admitted two offences of supplying Class A drugs and was jailed for 28 months.
The court heard the defendant has a “long record” of shoplifting linked to his drugs habit.
Barry Gilbert, mitigating, said: “He appreciates that using drugs is ruining his life and putting him into prison again and again and for longer and longer.
“This man is at the very bottom of the barrel as far as the drugs trade is concerned, and these are the people that police are catching and are being locked up.”
Mr Gilbert added: “He has been taking, successfully, instruction on not using drugs”.
Judge Mary Loram KC said she was not impressed with Kinghorn’s efforts to rehabilitate himself.
She said: “These offences took place three years ago and since then you have been dealt with for matters mostly, if not all, for shoplifting.
“You have clearly made no attempts at all while on the outside to address the addiction at the heart of your offending.”
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