A TEENAGER with a long record of motoring offences was back behind bars last night - but not before a plea to a court to lock him up somewhere close to home so his sick mother could visit him.

Robert Thompson from Darlington was sent to a young offenders' institution for four months by Harrogate magistrates after he admitted taking a car without the owner's consent and driving it while disqualified and without insurance.

Thompson, 18, of Portland Place, Darlington, who was also banned from the roads for a year was said by Sarah Tyrer, prosecuting, to have taken an H-registered Vauxhall Nova from outside the Ripon home of pensioner Harold Key, in the early hours of May 14 while breaking the terms of a curfew order which insisted he was at home between 7pm and 7am.

Police stopped him a short distance away, spotted the ignition had been tampered with and challenged him.

Mrs Tyrer said Thompson was a persistent offender with numerous convictions for car crime who at the time had been bailed by Richmond magistrates to appear at Teesside Crown Court on similar charges.

In mitigation Fazal Karim said Thompson, who suffered from a hyperactive disorder, was realistic enough to accept he was looking at a return to custody.

"He asks me to say in open court that he knows the inevitable is going to happen and can he be accommodated somewhere near Darlington so that his mother who is sick can visit him easily?"