TWO drug dealers are back behind bars thanks to the efforts of police.

Officers first spotted Shujaht Khan, 25, driving a Mini through the borough last April, Preston Crown Court was told.

But when officers eventually detained Khan they could find no incriminating materials on him and he was released.

Prosecutor Stephen Parker said his associate Asim Hussain, 34, was later stopped in the same Mini and was found to be carrying a wrap of crack cocaine. Later a search of his home in Nelson unearthed two plastic bags containing heroin with a street value of £400.

Mr Parker said this led police to carry out a search of Khan’s then home in Coleshill Avenue, Burnley.

And secreted in a hole in a garden wall was just over three grams of heroin and a mobile phone containing text messages related to drug dealing.

Quizzed by police later, Khan accepted he was holding the phone for someone else, the court heard, but denied sending the texts.

Hussain, of Railway Street, Nelson, admitted to being concerned in the supply of heroin, possession of crack cocaine with intent to supply and dangerous driving, relating to an unrelated incident from last October.

Khan, formerly of Coleshill Avenue and now of St Paul’s Road, Nelson, admitted to being concerned in heroin supply.

Jailing Hussain for 44 months, Judge Ian Leeming QC said he was satisfied the defendant had played a ‘significant role’ in the drug dealing.

The judge was told Hussain had served a 28-month jail term previously for supplying drugs and was imprisoned for five years in Manchester in September 2013 for possessing a prohibited weapon.

He was also banned from driving for two years.

Judge Leeming jailed Khan for 32 months. His criminal record included a four-year prison sentence for heroin dealing.

Joe Boyd, defending, said his client’s drug dealing was ‘small scale’. The defendant had suffered difficulties in his life.