A YOUNG dad involved in supplying hard drugs worth up to £1,000 a day for a month has been jailed for two years.

Christopher Taylor, 20, had heroin and cash on him when confronted by police yet officers might not have been able to prove he was dealing but for his own admissions, Burnley Crown Court heard.

Taylor, said to have been easy prey for more sophisticated drugs pushers, cried in the dock as a judge told him he had taken part in serious dealing.

Recorder Roger Farley QC said he accepted Taylor had been under duress when he offended, but that did not stand him in quite as good stead as he would think.

The judge went on: "If you don't assist the police, then you are protecting serious drug dealers. It's sentencing policy that those who protect serious drug dealers should receive the same level of sentence as serious drug dealers would if they are caught."

Taylor, of Hunslett Street, Burnley, admitted being concerned in the supply of heroin. Francis McEntee, prosecuting, told the court that last December police spotted Taylor in the passenger seat of a car in Belvedere Road, Burnley. He seemed edgy and fidgety.

Taylor's trousers were tucked into his socks and, when he was searched, officers found heroin. His home was then searched, and the full extent of the case against Taylor was based almost entirely on his own full and frank admissions.

When arrested, he also had £335 on him. He said he had been using about a gramme £40 worth of cocaine a week and had been dealing up to £1,000 of heroin a day to pay off a debt.

Philip Holden, defending, said Taylor, a labourer at a pet food manufacturers, was an unsophisticated offender with serious intellectual limitations.