A DRUG addict from Newport who was spared jail for shoplifting and attempted robbery has been sent to prison after being caught with crack and heroin just a month later.

Oliver Bryan of Chepstow Road was handed an 18 month suspended prison sentence in June for shoplifting and attempted robbery.

But the 36-year-old appeared in Cardiff Crown Court again today, Monday, having been arrested on the George Street Bridge on Thursday, July 13.

The court heard a police officer in an unmarked car had spotted Bryan walking along the bridge while fiddling with something in his pocket at about 4.40pm.

They had stopped and searched him, finding a crack pipe, and two packages, which were later found to be crack and diamorphine, or heroin.

The court also heard Bryan had failed to attend a thinking skills course and carried out only a portion of the unpaid work he had been ordered to carry out in June.

Judge Jeremy Jenkins said he was disappointed to see Bryan back in court, saying he had hoped the suspended sentence he was given in June would have been sufficient to keep him out of trouble.

“It seemed he had turned his life around and it seemed right to give him an opportunity,” he said.

“I honestly didn’t think he would be back.”

Addressing Bryan he said: “I gave you an opportunity. It seemed to me at the time you had got your life together and turned a corner.

“Or so I thought.”

He added he understood kicking an addiction to strong drugs was difficult.

“One appreciates it is not going to be an easy road,” he said.

“It’s not going to be possible to stop overnight.

“But you have only yourself to blame.”

He sentenced Bryan to 18 months in prison for breaching his suspended sentence and two six-month prison sentences for the two charges of possessing Class A drugs, to run concurrently, making a total of two years in jail.

He will also have to pay a victim surcharge, while a forfeiture and destruction order was made for the drugs and the crack pipe.