A DRUGS "go-between" helped to supply two under-cover police officers with Ecstasy and amphetamines at a nightclub, a court was told yesterday.

Joseph James Dodds, 19, was sent to a young offenders' institution for a year after he admitted supplying the drugs at the Kube club, in Spennymoor, in January and March last year.

Durham Crown Court heard that he was caught in a police operation to crack down on drug-dealing at licensed premises in the town, which was codenamed Operation Andes.

Shaun Dodds, prosecuting, said prison sentences of between two and four-and-a-half years had been passed so far in other cases involving defendants arrested as part of the operation.

He told the court that in the first case Dodds supplied the two officers with four Ecstasy tablets for £16, while in the second he passed on two bags of amphetamines for £10.

When arrested later, he admitted buying drugs for himself and said if asked he would sell to others.

Don MacFaul, mitigating, said Dodds, of Middleham Walk, Spennymoor, who was employed and had no previous convictions, was not a regular, inveterate dealer.

Passing sentence, Judge Richard Lowden said he accepted Dodds' role was as a go-between.

"Although you were involved towards the lower end of the scale, it is too serious to justify a non-custodial sentence," he said.