A NEW mum from Carlisle who was part of a lucrative ‘county lines’ drugs conspiracy has been spared an immediate prison sentence.

Sharnee Dawkins, 29, was heavily pregnant when a crown court jury convicted her of being part of a large-scale plot to bring heroin and crack cocaine from Liverpool to Cumbria for supply to local addicts. She had denied the offence.

Charged with conspiring to supply class A drugs, she told the court that she knew nothing about a bag of drugs which police found at her Carlisle home.

But a jury found her guilty by a majority verdict.

Jurors had previously been told that 13 other people - nine from Cumbria and four from the Merseyside area - had already admitted their part in the drug supply operation.

In court this week, Judge Peter Davies told Dawkins she would be the only person from the gang of conspirators who would not be given an immediate jail sentence.

The judge told her: “There is only one reason... She is the mother of a very small infant and that is the reason why. I am not going to deprive that infant of her mother, whatever the circumstances.”

The judge said he he had no doubt that Dawkins had been exploited by the Liverpool dealer whom she allowed to stay at her house.

The judge continued: “What he did was extremely serious and I have no doubt that he pulled the wool over your eyes and used your house and used your home.

“You are in a different position from one of the other female defendants: she went around with her child in a car and she was supplying. That’s why she went to prison.”

The judge sentenced Dawkins, formerly of Crummock Street in Carlisle to 12 months in jail but he suspended the term for two years. Judge Davies warned Dawkins that she would would serve that prison sentence if she commits further offences during the suspension period.

He also ruled that she must complete 20 days of rehabilitation activity with the Probation Service and observe a 7pm to 7am curfew for the next four months. Dawkins must also pay £140 victim surcharge.

Dawkins was one of only three people who denied involvement in what police said was a military-style drugs supply operation. Fifteen members of the conspiracy whose members targeted Carlisle have been given jail terms totalling almost 90 years.