Man caught with £600,000 worth of heroin jailed for three years

A man who was caught red-handed with heroin with a maximum street value of £600,000 was yesterday jailed for three years.

Charles Madden, 25, from Glasgow, admitted being concerned in the supply of the drug on June 8, last year.

The High Court in Glasgow heard that Madden was caught with three kilo blocks of heroin of 80 per cent purity in the front footwell of his Audi A3 following a police undercover operation.

The average purity of heroin in Scotland is 16 per cent.

Madden, a former car valeter who had to quit his job to become full-time carer for his mother, claimed he thought it was cannabis he had been given.

The court heard he agreed to act as a courier after getting into debt with drug dealers who sold him recreational drugs.

Defence counsel Tony Lenehan asked for his client not to be jailed, but given unpaid work in the community combined with him being tagged.

Mr Lenehan said: “I would ask for the court to do this, not out of sympathy for Mr Madden, but because of the problems of his mother.”

Judge Lord Burns told Madden: “You involved yourself in the chain of supply of a very substantial amount of class A drugs. You took that decision in the full knowledge you were the full-time carer for your mother.

“The seriousness of this case is such it requires a custodial sentence.”

Lord Burns told Madden that, but for his early guilty plea, he would have jailed him for four and a half years.