A FAILED businessman, caught storing the biggest police seizure of cannabis in the Basingstoke area during the last five years, has been sent to jail.

Detectives discovered the drugs haul, with a street value of £27,000, in a lock-up belonging to 37-year-old Timothy Walton, in Sherborne St John.

A team of 10 CID officers carried out the swoop in August last year following a telephone tip-off.

It took them four hours to find the 36 blocks of canna-bis resin - each weighing nine ounces - which had been hidden in a wardrobe in the premises.

Walton appeared at Winchester Crown Court for sentencing on Friday after changing his plea during a trial last month.

He admitted possession of drugs with intent to supply - a charge he denied at the start of the trial.

It was while giving evidence during the trial that he admitted knowing the drugs were in his lock-up. He still claimed they did not belong to him - but refused to say who did own them.

Sentencing Walton, Judge Charles Wade said he would be failing in his public duty if he did not pass a custodial sentence for the cannabis crime.

The judge added: "Possession of such a large quantity can clearly have only been for distribution and you must have known that when you discovered it on your premises.

"You effectively took control of the disposal of these drugs by not going to the police and by deciding to leave it to the owner to collect.

"If that person had collected it, you would have been facilitating that person in the distribution of that cannabis.

"That did not happen because the police acted promptly on information given to them."

Appealing to the judge to impose a light sentence, Walton's barrister, Ashley Ailes, told the court: "He's been very scared throughout these proceedings.

"He has lost his business and has been left with a £15,000 debt to the bank which he had taken out to start his own business.

"He's a man who has always worked hard, he has a steady relationship and is engaged.

"He is conscientious, hard-working and stable."

Sending Walton to prison for 18 months, Judge Wade said: "I take into account the loss of your business but this offence is so serious in my view that only a custodial sentence can be justified.

"I think you now accept that you were foolish in the extreme for not informing the police."

Speaking to The Gazette after the sentencing, Pc Brian Haughey the drugs officer who led the raid - said: "In the last five years there has never been a find anything near as big as this in the Basingstoke area.

"The cannabis would probably have been sold on to dealers who would have distributed it onto the streets of Basingstoke.

"Fortunately, we managed to intercept it before this happened."