TWO dealers who came to Southampton to sell class A drugs on the streets have been locked up for more than seven years in total.

Delan Daniel and Jonathan Badibanga were caught red-handed by officers who stopped the car they were in during their drugs run.

Prosecutor David Jenkins described how officers began searching the vehicle, at which point Daniel ran off.

CCTV tracked him and filmed him throwing away packages, which when later recovered were found to contain 20 deals of cocaine and 20 deals of heroin.

In all the drugs were estimated to have a street value of £800.

Daniel, 24, was arrested shortly afterwards with £340 in cash on him.

Badibanga, 23, remained in the car, where he was found with several mobile phones, which inquiries showed had been used to organise deals around the city.

Both men denied two counts of possession of class A with intent, but were convicted by a jury who disbelieved Daniel’s story that he was throwing away tissues.

Mitigating for Badibanga, Miss Ramsden said her client came from a good and successful family, was well educated and intelligent.

She explained that Badibanga, of Tudor Road, Southall, had intended to come to the city from his home in London for a driving theory test but had instead met up with the co-defendant.

However, she conceded that he was 40 minutes late for the test when he was stopped by officers in February last year. He was found with £75 on him.

The court heard that father-of-one Daniel, also from London, had previous convictions for possessing drugs but this was a “leap up” in his offending.

In handing down a five-year prison term to Daniel, Judge Derwin Hope said: “The courts will do whatever it can to not only punish people that have anything to do with drug dealing but to deter others from even thinking about it.”

He jailed Badibanga for 30 months.

An order was also made to confiscate the cash and destroy the recovered drugs.