Rail passenger caught with half-a-kilo of designer drug boarding train at Leeds

Christopher Turnbull-Allen, who later admitted having a £400-a-week mephedrone habit, was stopped by British Transport Police at Leeds Railway Station.

Leeds Crown Court heard this week that officers had been tipped off and were able to arrest him before the Carlisle-bound train left the platform at around 3pm on August 11 last year. The 36-year-old then claimed he did not know where he was travelling to, prosecutor Felicity Hemlin told the court.

They found him carrying four MDMA tablets worth up to £120, and 495 grammes of methylmethcathinone - also known as mephedrone, Mcat or MMC - worth up to £4,650.

Mephedrone was banned in 2010 and classified as a class-B drug. Prior to that, it was often described as a "legal high", sometimes advertised as plant food to bypass the laws, and taken by partygoers. Its effects are known to be similar to amphetamine.

Having been held on remand, Turnbull-Allen, of Westgarth Court, Kirkby Stephen, Cumbria, appeared in court over a video link from HMP Leeds. He admitted possession with an intent to supply a class-B drug, and possession of the MDMA pills, a class-A drug. He has 22 previous convictions for 31 offences, including dealing in mephedrone in 2019, for which he received a two-year jail sentence at York Crown Court.

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Mitigating, Emily Hassell said Turnbull-Allen's ongoing addiction to mephedrone led to him building up an expensive habit. She added: "Unlike heroin or cocaine, there is no medical regime to help someone to come off mephedrone." She said he was living with his grandmother and there was no lavish lifestyle to speak of.

Judge Christopher Batty jailed him for 22 months - 20 months for his latest offending, while two months of a previous suspended sentence were activated. He told him: "You have been here before so you know it has to be custody."

Speaking after the sentence, Investigating officer DS Lee Parsons of the British Transport Police said: "Transporting drugs on the railway is futile – we have eyes everywhere and you will be caught. We have plain clothes officers on the railway every day conducting operations to put drug suppliers like Turnbull-Allen behind bars. Thanks to the intelligence we received and the swift action of officers these illegal substances never made it onto the streets."