Woman smuggled drugs into jail inside her private parts
A woman smuggled drugs into jail inside her private parts then passed them to a prisoner during a visit.
Shelley Richardson, who was a heroin addict, had been "pressured" and "exploited" into smuggling the Class A package into HMP Northumberland on March 23 last year.
Prosecutor Antonia Adie, told Newcastle Crown Court: "CCTV shows her removing an item from her trousers and placing it onto a table where (the inmate) picked it up and put it in the rear of his trousers."
Prison staff stopped Richardson and she admitted it contained drugs but said she didn't know what kind of drugs.
When interviewed by police, she said she believed they were class A drugs.
Richardson, 55, of Saxon Way, Jarrow, South Tyneside, who has more than 100 previous convictions, pleaded guilty to conveying a banned article into prison on the basis she was pressured to deliver them to a stranger for money and that she was vulnerable due to her heroin addiction.
Miss Adie said: "She was given it in a pub and took it into prison by hiding it in her vagina."
The prisoner she gave them to was strip-searched but the drugs were not found.
Judge Julie Clemitson sentenced Richardson, who had been remanded in custody and appeared in court on a video-link from prison, to 16 months suspended for 18 months.
The judge said: "You took a package into Northumberland Prison and you did so because you were pressured into doing so.
"You had relapsed back into drug use and returned to old associates and that led to you committing this offence. However you have been drug-free now for a number of months, you have insight into the damage drugs do and you have demonstrated real remorse and regret for your actions."
Robin Patton, defending, said: "She has spent decades battling this addiction and she's been exploited for decades. This is just another way she has been exploited."
If anyone deserves a chance she does. She has demonstrated she's going to try to beat this addiction again. She's managed it quite a few times."