By Staff Reporter

Last updated at 12:48, Tuesday, 19 February 2013

A woman caught with £3,000-worth of heroin at her home told a court she had found the stash in her loft among her Christmas decorations.

Marie Annette Martin, 42, said she and her son were “ratching through” boxes just before Christmas 2011 when she found the drugs in a bin bag.

The mother-of-four, who lives in Anchor Close, Penrith, admitted she had been a heroin user, with a few short breaks when she managed to come off the drug, for 19 years.

She told the jury at Carlisle Crown Court she had not known the bag was in her loft.

But, she said, when her son passed it to her down the ladder she knew straight away what it was.

She said she put it in a kitchen drawer, away from her children, then in the early hours of the next morning hid a bit of it, first in her pocket and then in her bra.

Martin said she smoked small amounts of it over the next few days, but on December 19 a friend down the road told her on the phone that he had seen police heading for her house.

She said she ran to the kitchen, fetched the remaining heroin and took it out into her garden, where a police officer spotted her trying to throw the bag over the fence.

Earlier the court heard that police had retrieved the bag in the garden, and had then found a small amount of heroin in her bra.

When asked what it was she immediately admitted it was the class A drug, prosecuting counsel Brendan Burke said.

Mr Burke said that in total the police found more than 30 grams of heroin.

“That is a lot,” he said.

Martin has pleaded not guilty to possessing the drug with intent to supply it.

The trial continues.

First published at 12:45, Tuesday, 19 February 2013
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk