PRISON sentences await those who give cannabis to their friends, a York judge has warned.

District judge Adrian Lower was sentencing Keiran Steven Robinson, 21, who had supplied his friends for a couple of weeks.

“It’s not a harmless drug,” he said at York Magistrates' Court. “So often … people who start to use cannabis start to use other harder drugs as well.

“Supplying on a social basis is so serious an offence it must be dealt with by the imposition of a custodial sentence.”

He passed a 24-week prison sentence, but suspended it because Robinson had no previous convictions and because of matters he had read in a doctor’s report and in a letter about Robinson’s childhood.

Robinson, of Princess Drive, Acomb, pleaded guilty to supplying cannabis between July 25, 2019, and August 10, 2019, and possessing 11.8g of cannabis with intent to supply it to others on August 9, 2019.

The prison term was suspended for two years on condition Robinson does 20 days’ rehabilitative activities and 200 hours’ unpaid work.

He must also pay a £122 statutory surcharge and £85 prosecution costs.

Colette Dixon, prosecuting, said when Robinson was arrested, he had £105 on him on cash and a mobile phone containing messages indicating he had been selling cannabis.

After examining the messages, the prosecution accepted he had only supplied cannabis to friends or friends of friends and had only received money to recoup what he himself had spent to buy the drug, she said.

For Robinson, Steve Munro said he was on a bricklayers' course at college and was trying to put drug supply behind him.