A DEALER was supplying heroin as his two young children lived in squalor with him.

Burnley Crown Court heard how Wesley Whitehead, 33, had been selling drugs to about six users to fund his own addiction for just over a week.

Police who turned up at his Accrington home, where he lived with his partner and the youngsters, aged five and three, saw a coffee table covered in debris and pieces of tin foil.

Officers found heroin under the stairs, as well as two sets of scales with traces of drugs on them and drug-related text messages on a mobile phone.

Whitehead, of Lindadale Close, Accrington, had admitted poss-essing heroin with intent to supply.

He was given 51 weeks behind bars, suspended for two years, with two years supervision, 150 hours unpaid work and a drugs programme.

James Heyworth, for the defendant, said it was a shame to see him in the dock facing such a serious matter.

In the past, he had been able to pay for his heroin from his employment, but he lost his job.

Sentencing, Recorder Andrew Long said anybody who supplied heroin would be given a custodial sentence and 98 per cent of them would go to prison immediately, but he had been persuaded to take a more positive course.