A MAN described by a judge as a "professional burglar" raided the homes of two Blackburn women after seeing them both go out.

Drug user Mark Brown, with 22 previous convictions for burglary, also struck at other properties before he was apprehended.

He was given a sentence of three years and ten months in jail when he appeared at Preston Crown Court.

Brown, 28, of Shakespeare Way, Blackburn, had pleaded guilty to two charges of burglary and asked for five others to be considered.

Mr Roger Green, prosecuting, told how a woman living on Francis Street, Mill Hill went out shopping last month and returned to find items worth over £1,800 had been stolen, including jewellery partly inherited by the occupant.

The defendant had climbed a six-foot rear wall and completely removed a double glazed window to get inside the home.

The same month another address was burgled by Brown in New Wellington Street. A kitchen window was forced open and computer equipment and other property, worth £2,450 in total, was taken. Brown was arrested at an address in Bonsall Street, also in the same area.

He went on to tell police he had seen both women go out and had burgled their premises soon after.

In July he had been released on licence from a five-year sentence imposed for burglary.

Mr Richard Bennett, defending, said a significant misuse of drugs had been a problem for Brown. He stayed drug free for a while when released on licence, but was offered heroin when a relationship hit problems.