A CAREER criminal has found himself back in court.

Jeffrey Trengove received a fresh conviction after he faced magistrates to stand trial over a vehicle offence.

He was charged with being the keeper of an unlicensed vehicle and was due to stand trial before South Cumbria Magistrates' Court. 

The court heard the 66-year-old kept a vehicle without a licence on July 23 after the previous licence had expired on June 12.

It meant he avoided £290 in vehicle excise duty. 

Trengove, of Barrow's Hawke Street, previously denied the offences and was due to stand trial.

But Trengove absented himself from the case, court papers said.

He was said to have been told the issues he wished to raise - the loss of his driving licence and alleged potential misconduct by police officers - were not relevant to the case.

He was found guilty after the case was proved in his absence.

Magistrates fined him £220 for the offence and ordered him to pay £48.34 in back duty. 

In June 2019 Trengove was jailed for seven years for possession with intent to supply heroin after being convicted of drug dealing for the third time.

Trengove was arrested while walking through Ormsgill in 2016 after Inspector Jim Bailey, of Barrow Police, hunted him down on his police bicycle.

Insp Bailey said he felt the defendant try to flee but was able to wrestle him to the ground and handcuff him with the help of a second officer.

During the trial the officer said he found "white rocks" on Trengove, then 61, after stopping him on the street and searching him.

Tests later revealed the substance to be subutex, a heroin substitute, the court heard.

At a proceeds of crime hearing a year after the conviction, Preston Crown Court heard Trengove was selling the class A drug on the streets of Barrow for six years - while claiming Disability Living Allowance.

Examination of Trengove’s bank accounts showed more than £33,000 of unexplained cash deposits into his Nationwide, which were used to buy high value goods such as televisions, the court was told.

The drug dealer had previous convictions for fraud, drug offences and handling stolen goods.