A Nelson man was paid £30 a week to store drugs at his house for a dealer.

When police searched Joseph Bradshaw’s home on December 9, 2021, they found drugs with a street value of up to £1,220, and with the defendant’s fingerprints found on the packaging.

A small bag of cocaine worth around £20 was also found under the floorboards, and prosecuting barrister Wayne Jackson said it was Bradshaw himself who told police about this.

Bradshaw, 49, told officers he was not a dealer and that he was simply storing the drugs for somebody else.

Messages analysed on his mobile phone found no evidence to support any street dealing.

Mr Jackson said Bradshaw was being “cuckooed” by the dealer and that the arrangement between the pair ended when he was accused of using the stored drugs.

Charlotte Phillips, mitigating, said her client no longer used drugs and “has not for a long time.”

She added: “This has been an extremely big wake-up call. It wasn’t something he realised he was getting himself into. Naivety and vulnerability played a significant factor in this offending.”

Recorder Paul Hodgkinson, sentencing at Burnley Crown Court, said: “The scourge of drugs is horrific and causes damage throughout communities and families, creates crime, creates depression, creates family problems.

“You know it’s very serious and ordinarily you know I’d be sending you downstairs to serve a custodial sentence.

“I genuinely hope the sentence I’m about to pass will allow you to turn things around. Moving to Oxford seems like a very good idea to me. Getting work and getting back on track equally seems like a good idea to me.

“You stashed drugs at your house so drug dealers could peddle misery. This is a part of the world with particular problems with class A drugs and the problems that brings with it.

“Good luck, you’ve been given an opportunity today.”

Bradshaw, of Whitehall Street, Nelson, pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of cannabis and crack cocaine.

He was sentenced to two years in prison suspended for two years, with 180 hours of unpaid work.