A MAN who was caught dealing Class A drugs in Warwick when he was already on bail for an earlier driving offence has been jailed.
Anthony Bromley pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to dangerous driving, driving while disqualified, possessing heroin and crack cocaine, and possessing heroin with intent to supply.
Bromley, age 37 of Hewitt Avenue, Coventry, was jailed for four years and two months – consecutive to seven months of a suspended sentence he was also ordered to serve for a previous driving offence.
Prosecutor Peter Arnold said: “He has a very persistent criminal record, with many, many offences of driving while disqualified, and this is his third for dangerous driving.”
Last year Bromley – a dad-of-six – was arrested after police spotted him driving a Jaguar erratically.
While being pursued by officers he went the wrong way around a traffic island, went through two red lights, hit the central reservation and even crashed into an oncoming HGV – but still kept going.
Eventually he came to a halt and ran off, throwing away a bag containing 35 wraps of heroin and crack cocaine before being caught and arrested. He pleading guilty to possession.
Bromley was granted bail, and in March, for an offence of assault dating back to October, he was given a nine-month prison sentence suspended for two years.
So on May 3, he was on bail and subject to the suspended sentence when police officers saw him driving a car in Emscote Road, Warwick, again in breach of his disqualification.
They stopped him, and in the car officers found ‘a whole range of class A drugs paraphernalia,’ 87 £10 wraps of heroin, various phones and a notebook with a drug-related entry in it.
Mr Arnold said that Bromley’s previous convictions included one when he was 18 for possessing amphetamine with intent to supply, but since then they were mainly for driving offences.
Simon Hunka, defending, said: “He doesn’t have the sort of history one would associate with a drug dealer. It’s something he hasn’t done for many years.
“He has had a significant drug addiction, but he was able to live quite a purposeful life.
“He is a labourer, with a forklift and dumper truck driver’s licence, and he is a father of six children aged between three and 16.”
Mr Hunka explained that although he was finally dealt with for assault and causing damage, Bromley had originally faced a much more serious charge, and his drug use spiralled.
“He found himself in more and more debt, and was not able to keep up with it, and he engaged in behaviour he hadn’t indulged in since he was 18, because he could see no other way out.”
Judge Andrew Lockhart QC jailed Bromley for 40 months for the drugs offences, with ten months consecutive for dangerous driving, as well as imposing seven months of the suspended sentence.
Of the driving, the judge told him: “There were collisions. Happily no-one was seriously hurt, but that was more by luck than judgement.
“Your addiction had got the better of you, and you had put yourself in a position where you were dealing in drugs.”
