A man with a 22-year record of stealing from shops to feed his heroin addiction was locked up for four months after he pleaded to go to jail.

Alvin Lewis Cross, 37, appeared before Bingley magistrates yesterday and pleaded guilty to three charges of theft and one charge of having a bladed weapon in a public place.

And, through his solicitor Sajad Chowdry, he asked the magistrates to lock him up because he said it was the only way he could be stopped from taking the drug.

The court heard how Cross, of no fixed address, had been offered a series of alternative punishments for his crimes in the past, and had been considered for a drug-testing order.

But Mr Chowdry said: "If he took up that offer, he believes he would fall at the first hurdle. He has taken a very realistic view and asks the magistrates today to give him a custodial sentence.

"He has a history of similar offences that go back 22 years, involving exactly the same type of events. He needs his heroin so he goes out and shoplifts. He has had enough and he wants to stop but, unfortunately, the only way he will get off the heroin is if he is in custody."

Cross was jailed for two months concurrent on each theft charge and was given two months consecutive for possessing the bladed instrument.