A ROBBER who "plundered" a house while on parole and filled a suitcase with loot has been sent back to jail.

Curtis Kenneth Turpin was reported to police by staff at YACRO hostel in Walmgate, York, after they saw him with an expensive bike, Giles Grant told the court in prosecution.

He had stolen it from a house in St Andrewgate, York. Police found more stolen items in his hostel room.

Turpin had used a jemmy to break in while the house's occupants were out and searched every room before filling a suitcase with a laptop, television, medicines, alcohol, jewellery and other items and leaving.

He was on parole at the time, having been released partway through a sentence of three years and nine months for mugging a student in the street at night.

Judge Paul Batty QC told him at York Crown Court: "Within weeks of your release, here you were plundering a dwelling house."

He jailed Turpin for 27 months and described him as having an "appalling" record including the robbery in 2013.

That was committed shortly after he had been released from a sentence for another street robbery.

Turpin, 28, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to burglary.

His solicitor advocate Mark Partridge said he had little memory of what he had done. At the time, he had been suffering from anxiety, depression and panic attacks and had been self-medicating himself with Valium.

His prison licence had been revoked following his arrest and since then, he had been taking courses to tackle his drug and drink problem. He hoped eventually to go to university.

In April 2014, York Crown Court heard how Turpin and an accomplice, one disguised with a balaclava and the other with a hoodie and scarf, came up behind the student on Huntington Road at 1am, poked a sharp object in his neck and forced him to hand over his hoodie, headphones and phone.

Recorder Simon Myerson QC said they had carried out the robbery "for the hell of it".

Police later found a knife and the student's phone in Turpin's bedroom.