A drug dealer was seen topping up a drug phone at a Tesco store just minutes before bulk messages were sent out to addicts across Swindon.

Police saw Jake Lewis putting credit on the ‘line’, used to advertise illicit goods for sale, at a Tesco Express store in Swindon on April 8 at around 10am.

Just minutes after they witnessed him do this, the number sent bulk messages to a database of vulnerable users advertising drugs for sale from the drugs network.

Swindon Crown Court heard on Wednesday (September 7) that he had a £2,000 debt to those who ran the network, and his role was limited to bagging the drugs and operating the phone.

Lewis was jailed for four years and one month after Judge Jason Taylor QC acknowledged the defendant was “resigned to his fate”.

Earlier, prosecutor Gary Venturi told the court how Wiltshire Police had been tipped off that officers were aware of a drugs supply line operating in Swindon.

He was arrested on July 7 of this year, and has 12 previous convictions for 30 offences.

Among those was an unrelated matter of affray, for which he was given a 13-month prison sentence suspended for 2 years, just four months before these offences.

Defending, Emma Handslip said: “The phone wasn’t recovered, the SIM wasn’t recovered, and there is no drugs or paraphernalia there.

“There is evidence of others operating the phone. It isn’t his drug line.

“If you’re bagging drugs, you’re not running the drugs, you’re not going to the runners and directing the runners, you’re not aware of what others are doing.”

Miss Handslip continued that Lewis, of Barrington Close, hid his drug debt from those around him, but had “taken huge strides” on his previous suspended sentence order.

Sentencing Lewis, who previously pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of crack cocaine and heroin, Judge Taylor said he was “trusted enough to hold a drug line and top it up”.

“You might not have been the only one doing that but a drug line is the most important weapon in a drug dealer’s armoury, and the fact you were trusted with it speaks volumes.”

Referencing the suspended sentence order and his attempt to move on, Judge Taylor said that Lewis was “held back by this debt which predated” the order.

Lewis was jailed for a total of 49 months. The drugs were forfeited and destroyed.