AN INHERITANCE fund drug dealer must pay back £20,000 in ill-gotten gains.

Ross Zielinski was sentenced in January to two years and three months imprisonment after pleading guilty to selling cocaine and cannabis in the town.

He had been left £70,000 by his grandmother. But the sizeable inheritance was left sitting in the 29-year-old’s bank account, while he made thousands out of peddling the class A and B drugs.

He had been caught when drugs squad officers spotted Zielinski acting suspiciously in a Ford Fiesta in Blunsdon St Andrew last year. Raiding his home, they found £900 of cannabis and caught Zielinski trying to flush 1.5g of super-strength cocaine down the toilet.

Yesterday at Swindon Crown Court, he was ordered to pay back £20,000 to the authorities under Proceeds of Crime Act rules.

George Threlfall, prosecuting, said: “He had an inheritance he had withdrawn some £45,800 and that’s unaccounted for. The crown accept all of that money he obtained or is likely to have obtained legitimately after an inheritance from his grandmother.”

However, the defendant still had around £10,000 frozen in a Santander bank account and £2,420 cash was seized by police at Zielinski’s house. It had been agreed between the parties Zielinski would pay back £20,000.

Judge Peter Crabtree told Zielinski, who appeared before the Swindon court over video link, to expect nine months in jail if he did not pay back the cash in three months.