Drugs cops raiding the house of a suspected dealer found him naked at the top of the stairs.

Dean Gunning, 30, had been selling cocaine and cannabis for around four weeks when police went through the doors of his Harwell home on January 23, 2019, and discovered him without any clothes on.

The paraphernalia linked to his illegal sideline selling drugs were found in a locked safe in his bedroom.

He had two sets of digital scales, 37g of cannabis worth an estimated £470 on the street and a ‘tick list’ detailing his customers and the amounts they owed.

Messages found on his phone showed he’d been selling ‘smoke’ - or cannabis – ‘sniff’ and ‘flake’ - slang terms for powder cocaine – from Christmas Eve 2018. One message detailed a price of £130 for a ‘half ball’, or 1.75g, of cocaine.

Just £40 was found in his bedroom together with the drugs and the paraphernalia.

He was interviewed by the police and answered no comment to the questions asked of him.

Judge Michael Gledhill QC questioned why it had taken three years for the case to reach sentencing. Jonathan Stone, prosecuting, said there had been a delay in the investigation, he was first before the courts in January 2021 and the case listed for trial at the end of the year. He changed his pleas shortly before the trial.

The court heard that Gunning’s life had changed significantly in the three years since he was arrested. He had met a girlfriend, with whom he now had a young daughter, and had got part-time labouring work. He had the offer of full-time employment with a construction firm.

At the time of the raid, he had been selling drugs to which he was addicted himself.

Sentencing him on Friday to two years’ imprisonment suspended for two years, Judge Gledhill told Gunning: “If you had been dealt with in 2020, which you ought to have been, you would have got a sentence of at least three years’ imprisonment – probably more as I’m not terribly sure that you’re not in a significant role [on the sentencing guidelines] because you had two sets of electronic scales, there is a safe into which you had secreted these items.

“You were involved in drugs for a relatively short period – for about four weeks or so. But how it comes about that an intelligent man like you, who works hard, can get involved in drugs is beyond me.”

Gunning, of Gaveston Road, Harwell, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to being concerned in supplying cocaine and cannabis and possession of 37g of cannabis. As part of his two year suspended sentence he must do 150 hours of unpaid work and pay £1,200 in costs.