Woman who smuggled spice into Wakefield prison avoids jail
A woman caught smuggling drugs into a prison has been spared custody.
Corinne Depass was found with a quantity of the synthetic cannabis drug, spice, and the prescription drug, pregabalin.
She was being recalled to prison at the time, but the judge at Leeds Crown Court spared her custody, because he said it was for her own personal use.
The heavily-convicted 44-year-old was brought to HMP New Hall, in Flockton, near Wakefield, on April 14 last year.
Intelligence suggested she may be carrying prohibited items so officers carried out the search, prosecutor Zanisha Herbert told the court.
Depass pulled a crack pipe from her bra, but she was then subject to a strip search, when the drugs were spotted between her legs in a green plastic bag.
There was 17 grammes of spice and four capsules of pregabalin.
Depass, of Edge Lane, Liverpool, admitted two counts of conveying prohibited items into prison.
She has 55 convictions for 154 offences, including thefts and ABH.
No mitigation was offered due to Judge Ray Singh’s assurance she would not be returned to prison.
Instead, he said he would take an “unusual course of action”, and gave her a 12-month conditional discharge.