Wakefield dealer swallowed drugs before arrest: Toilet visit led to charges

A dealer who swallowed hundreds of pounds worth of class A drugs just before he was arrested was taken to hospital where the drugs were retrieved after passing through his system, a court heard.
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Stephen Shipley, 49, refused to stop after police spotted him using his mobile phone while driving a Peugeot car on Wakefield Road, Pontefract, Leeds Crown Court was told.

Katy Varlow, prosecuting, said Shipley carried on driving for around half-a-mile and used the opportunity to swallow a "significant" amount of class A drugs during the incident on January 23 2019.

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Miss Varlow said police asked him what he had swallowed when he did stop, adding: "He had 20 heroin and 15 crack, in his own words."

Police spotted Stephen Shipley using a mobile phone while driving on Wakefield Road, Pontefract. 
Image: Google.Police spotted Stephen Shipley using a mobile phone while driving on Wakefield Road, Pontefract. 
Image: Google.
Police spotted Stephen Shipley using a mobile phone while driving on Wakefield Road, Pontefract. Image: Google.

Miss Varlow said: "He was taken to Pinderfields Hospital where the drugs passed through his system and were retrieved."

The court heard police found one just one package of crack cocaine in the car Shipley had been driving.

A total of 817 milligrammes of cocaine in 16 packets was retrieved in hospital along with two packets of crack cocaine.

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Also retrieved in hospital was 1.3 grammes of heroin in 11 packages.

Miss Varlow said the total street value of all the drugs seized was £420.

Police seized Shipley's mobile phone and a debt list was found at his home address.

Miss Varlow said Shipley, a father-of-two, had committed offences of drug driving and driving with no insurance on January 10 2019.

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He was sentenced to a community order for those offences on April 30 2019.

Shipley, of Wellesley Green, Wakefield, admitted three charges of possessing class A drugs with intent to supply.

Mark McKone, mitigating, said: "He is quite clearly free from heroin, which was behind his offending."

Probation officer Mick Berry said Shipley didn't start using heroin and crack cocaine until after a marriage breakdown.

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Mr Berry said: "He was thrown into a social circle which he had never been in contact with before.

"He was effectively selling drugs to pay for his own habit.

"He has for the most part been employed in the driving industry up to December 2018.

"The drugs history thankfully is behind him . He said he went to Turning Point in Wakefield and said within three months he had desisted from his drug use."

Judge Christopher Batty handed Shipley a two-year prison sentence, suspended for two years and ordered him to do 200 hours unpaid work.

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Shipley must also comply with a six month 8pm to 6am electronically monitored curfew.

Judge Batty told him: "It is difficult to imagine how someone who was in the business as successful as yours would find himself unkempt, bedraggled and swallowing wraps of class A drugs to avoid detection by police. It's a long way to fall.

"It is clear that you were at rock bottom. What is apparent from what I have read is that your path into the addiction to class A drugs is a very unusual and very sad path. I don't propose to rerun those details now.

"Since you were involved in the dealing of class A drugs you have done everything you possibly can to sort things out."

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He added: "The last 16 or 17 months since you were arrested must have been extremely difficult for your mum and your family generally.

"People who sell drugs go to prison almost without exception. I don't think I have read a story like this and I'm prepared to make an exception.

"You have done everything you can to rehabilitate yourself."