A bricklaying student tried to dash out of Marks & Spencer in Bury town centre without paying for a bottle of vodka, a court heard.

Christopher Lomax (22) admitted the theft of the bottle, worth £14, but told Bury magistrates that he had not lapsed back into a cycle of offending to fund a drugs habit. He said he had asked police to be drug-tested following the incident. "I knew it would be negative and that would help me prove this was a one-off," he said.

Mr Donald Fletcher, prosecuting, said Lomax, of Holland Rise, Rochdale, had 40 convictions on his record.

Defending, Mr Stanley Sumara said Lomax had effected a "dramatic change" in his life from a person on heroin and cocaine to someone who no longer had a drugs problem. "This was a one-off lapse," Mr Sumara explained.

The defendant was killing time in Bury while waiting for a bus to his mother's.

Magistrates fined Lomax £30 and ordered him to pay £30 court costs.