A recovering drug addict risked activation of a suspended prison sentence by stealing three packets of caramel slices from a branch of Greggs.

Daniel McGill was given a ten-month prison sentence, suspended for a year, for a non-domestic burglary, in March last year.

He was subsequently caught in possession of three types of class C drugs on April 23, last year, when he also obstructed a police constable in execution of his duty.

Charged with those offences, it put him at risk of having the ten-month sentence activated.

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The case came before Judge James Adkin at Durham Crown Court, in January.

Having been told of McGill’s efforts to overcome a long-term heroin addiction, which has been the cause of many of his past 73 offences, Judge Adkin agreed to defer the sentence for six months to see if the defendant could continue to make progress on a drug rehabilitation requirement, urging him to, “keep off the opiates”.

But, five days after that hearing, the 36-year-old defendant, of Bede Terrace, Bowburn, was caught stealing three packets of caramel slices, worth a total of £7.80, from Greggs, in Durham.

Tony Davis, for McGill, told a recent hearing at the court: “Sentence was deferred in January on condition he kept out of trouble and complied with the drug rehabilitation requirement.

“I know he didn’t fully comply as he helped himself to some caramel slices at Greggs in the city centre.”

But Mr Davis said otherwise the defendant has striven to comply and, “save himself”, from the activation of the prison sentence.

Mr Davis told Judge Adkin at today's sentence hearing: “He is doing really well at the moment.”

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Judge Adkin, who was given updated probation reports on McGill’s progress, said: “He is technically in breach of a suspended sentence order.”

He told McGill, however: “You have done very well, with one sole slip, and you’ve recently had a clean drug test, so I won’t punish you by sending you to prison today.”

The judge, therefore, imposed a 12-month community order, to include attending 20 rehabilitation activity days overseen by the Probation Service.

But he said he would have to mark the breach with a nominal £5 fine, £2.80 less than the overall cost of the stolen caramel slices.

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