Dealer had £47,000 worth of cannabis stashed at his parents' Leeds home

More than 4.7kg of the drug was located inside the property on Hollin Park Crescent following the police bust on the morning of May 12. Timothy Hall was the only person inside the house at the time and told officers: “I have some weed upstairs, I’m being forced to keep it. It’s not mine.”

Following a sweep of the property, police found bags filled with cannabis, several phones, a bag full of grip-seal dealer bags, scales and a dealer “tick list” containing names and amount of cash possibly owed, prosecutor Rhianydd Clement told Leeds Crown Court today.

During his interview with police, he again reiterated that he was being forced to stash the drugs but refused to provide further details. He also refused to provide his pin code for his iPhone, and said the other phones were simply his old phones that he no longer used.

The 27-year-old, of Hollin Park Crescent, later admitted possession with intent to supply cannabis. He has eight previous convictions for nine offences, including dealing in cannabis in 2015, possession of cannabis in 2016 and dealing in Class A drugs in 2017, for which he received a 28-month jail sentence.

A probation report was read out to the court for his latest offending in which it was claimed that he was “deeply regrets” becoming in involved and “made a stupid mistake”. It was heard that he now works for a roofing firm but had been on the sick for the last month after breaking his leg.

Mitigating, Adrian Pollard conceded that Hall had to have been “relatively trusted” in the drug-dealing chain of command to have that amount of cannabis at his home. He added: “Because of his lifestyle, he is not at the top of the tree and he lives with his parents.

“Despite his previous convictions he does present as quite a vulnerable young person. He has faced the music right away and admitted his part.”

Judge Mushtaq Khokhar told Hall: “This is the third offence of drug dealing in eight years and you did not learn from your last spell in custody. I can’t suspend the sentence.” He jailed him for 10 months.