A HEROIN and crack cocaine dealer who hid his drugs in a Kinder egg in a convenience store has been jailed.

Robert Scott McConnell, 42, ducked into a One Stop shop when he spotted police following him, said Rachael Landin, prosecuting.

They cornered him in the alcohol aisle, but not before he had secreted some of his drugs in a Kinder Egg, put it on a shelf in the shop, and hidden a box containing more drugs at the back of the shop.

He still had 13.7g of heroin on him when they arrested him.

He also had mobile phones on which he had sent "broadcast messages" to would-be buyers claiming he had "the best product in town".

McConnell had previously served a prison sentence for supplying both heroin and crack cocaine.

"You knew exactly what you were doing," Judge Simon Hickey told him at York Crown Court. "Here you are again."

He jailed McConnell for three years and four months and warned him that if he was caught dealing in hard drugs again, he would be jailed for at least seven years.

McConnell, of St Leonard's Crescent, Scarborough, pleaded guilty to possessing heroin with intent to supply it and possessing crack cocaine with intent to supply it.

He was already serving a 12-week prison sentence for driving whilst disqualified and possession of buphrenorphine, a Class C drug. Both offences were committed on September 13.

For him, Emma Hughes said McConnell himself had told police about the drugs he had hidden in the shop.

"He didn't want any children to get hold of them," she said. "Although he knows selling drugs is wrong, he does have some morals."

He had been selling drugs to fund his own habit, as he was a regular user of both heroin and cocaine.

McConnell had described hearing voices in his mind at an earlier stage of the case, but he had been seeing a psychiatric nurse while on remand in prison and was taking anti-psychotic medicine.

Ms Landin said on September 24, police saw McConnell talking to a woman near Boyes in Market Way, Scarborough, at 8pm.

They followed him and he went into the One Stop shop.

Staff there directed officers towards the back of the shop.

Police covered both exits to the aisle where McConnell was, and stopped him as he tried to evade them.

Officers found a pack of brown powder on him that forensic scientists later identified as 13.7g of heroin.

A police drugs expert estimated the drugs would have raised about £700 in street deals.

Later officers returned to the shop, where they found the Kinder egg and shop staff showed them the box containing drugs they had found.