A JUDGE told two Worcester drug dealers before sentencing them that he was going to do something he had never done before – allow them their freedom.

Judge Patrick Thom-as QC told them that normally it would be jail for people dealing in hard drugs but in their case they needed help rather than punishment.

He suspended one-year jail sentences on Richard Luce and Scott Goodwin for 12 months.

He ordered Goodwin to do 100 hours of unpaid work for the community. Luce, aged 38, of St Catherine’s Vale, off Wyld’s Lane, Worcester, and Good-man, 29, of The Hop Market, Worcester, had pleaded guilty at Wor-cester Crown Court; Luce to supplying heroin and Goodman to being concerned in the supply of the drug.

Police saw two men acting suspiciously in High Street, Worcester, on May 30, said Charles Hardy, prosecuting.

They were followed with the help of CCTV to the canal bank, where Goodman and another man were arr-ested. This other man was later fined.

Luce turned up at the canalside and was also arrested. Goodman said he was drunk and had been contacted by the third man asking for drugs so he had telephoned Luce.

He had not made money out of the deal.

Mark Sheward, for Goodman, said he had a 17-year heroin addiction but had stopped using recently.

He had contacted Luce as an act of compassion to help a friend desperate for drugs.

Sarah Brady, for Luce, described him as an unhappy and lonely man. However, she said he had referred himself to a drugs team for help.

The judge accepted it was small-scale dealing but told the defendants that people who dealt in drugs ruined the lives of others.

He was taking an exceptional course in not sending them to custody immediately and was giving them a last chance.