A burglar has increased a lengthy prison sentence after a cell search turned up a stash of mobile phones, chargers and SIM cards.
Already serving 14 years and eight months for offences of aggravated burglary and possessing cocaine and heroin, Nico White-Channer faced a court for a second time over the discovery.
He was given an extra ten months consecutive to his original sentence for having the phones, SIM cards and chargers inside HMP Lowdham Grange.
He was due for release in October 2024. Now this will increase by at least five months - half of the fresh ten month sentence - before he is out on licence.
Nottingham Crown Court heard he arrived at the Nottinghamshire jail from HMP Bedford at 4.20pm on October 2 last year.
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One phone and a charger were recovered from him, leading to the search of his cell that evening where four phones, six chargers and various SIM cards were discovered in a tin.
Steve Gosnell, mitigating, said: "The defendant knows he shouldn't have had the items. It is quite clear he shouldn't. There is no suggestion the items found are linked to crime in any way."
The one phone found on 27-year-old White-Channer, now in HMP Nottingham, was used to contact his unwell mother.
Judge Steven Coupland, who sentenced him, said he accepted this account.
But the number of other phones White-Channer was "either taking them in at the request of someone else, who might have used them, or intended using them yourself as currency whilst in prison".
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