BED and breakfast did not come cheap for John James Quinn, who insisted on being an overnight guest of the police.

A court heard that he objected to being turfed out of a police station in the early hours of the morning, after being charged with being drunk and disorderly, and threw a brick through a shop window to ensure he was taken back before his bed got cold. But the constabulary hospitality cost him dear when he appeared before magistrates the following day and was ordered to pay £300 compensation for the damage caused. Quinn, 34, of Billinge Street, Blackburn, pleaded guilty to criminal damage.

Lisa Worsley, prosecuting, said a police sergeant on duty in the police station had looked out of the window and saw Quinn take a brick and throw it through the window of a nearby shop.

A spokesman for Blackburn police later said people were not usually so keen to spend a night in the cells. "We do a half decent breakfast, but it's not worth £300," she said.

"For that sort of money he would be better off booking into the Ritz."