A JUDGE has hit out at 'local police inactivity,' after it took three years to bring a Waterfoot burglar to justice.

Burnley Crown Court heard how the victim, recognised culprit and then drug addict Graham Byrne, made a complaint to the police and Byrne had still been in the area. But he wasn't arrested until this July and walked free from court after Judge Anthony Proctor said the case was 'extraordinary'.

The judge said the procedings could have been 'done and dusted' two years ago and it was 'very odd indeed' why they weren't.

He told the defendant: "I don't know why it took the police three years virtually to find you when you were clearly identified at the scene by the complainant. Why on earth it wasn't pursued before I fail to understand."

Judge Proctor said although Byrne, who had four previous convictions for burglary or attempted burglary, had a 'checkered past,' he had not offended since and it would be wrong to send him to jail now.

The defendant, 28, now of Newark Road, Syke, Rochdale, had admitted burglary and been committed for sentence by the Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale agistrates. He was given a nine months prison sentence suspended for a year.

The court was told a computer, worth £1,200, was taken in the raid in August 1999. The victim had recognised Byrne and shouted hello to him as he got into a car.

When the defendant was arrested in July, he fully admitted what he had done and said he had been dependant on drink and drugs at the time. Byrne's last conviction for burglary before that was 1994.

Richard Orme, defending, said to send Byrne to custody would be wholly wrong and would send out the wrong message. In the last three or four years, he had got his life back on track. He was now rid of drugs and was law-abiding.