A MAN who was "mooching" in the early hours of the morning ended up committing acquisitive offences.

Blackburn magistrates heard Anthony Ronald Monaghan stole spirits from a pub cellar after seeing the door was open and entered another pub through an insecure window.

On the second occasion he activated a burglar alarm and ran off after stealing four charity boxes which he emptied and used the cash to buy drugs and alcohol.

Monaghan, 41, of Accrington Road, Burnley, pleaded guilty to burglary at the Turf Hotel and theft of spirits worth £154, theft of a pram cover from a car and burglary at The Boot Inn and theft of charity boxes. He was made subject to a community order for 18 months with a nine months drug rehabilitation requirement and 15 days rehabilitation activity requirement and a curfew for four weeks between 9 pm and 7 am. He was ordered to pay £154 compensations to the Turf Hotel, £200 to the Boot Inn and £245 to the owner of the pram cover to cover the cost of the item and the damage caused to her car.

Tracy Yates, prosecuting, said Monaghan was caught on CCTV at the Turf Hotel, the car park of the Star Hotel where he broke a car window with a brick before stealing a pram cover, and at the Boot Inn.

When he was interviewed Monaghan told police he had been "mooching around" when he saw some coins on the floor in the Turf Hotel beer garden and climbed over the fence to get them. He noticed the cellar door was open and climbed in.

At the Boot Inn he said he went into the beer garden to collect cigarette ends and noticed a window wasn't closed properly.

The court heard Monaghan had previously got himself clean of heroin when he got married. When the marriage broke down he still managed to stay clean but last Christmas people living in the same block of flats offered him heroin.

"He was feeling low and lonely, he was offered drugs and it has been a slippery slope since then," said Peter King, defending.