A WOMAN smuggled drugs into a prison after she was warned her jailbird boyfriend would be "slashed up" if she did not, a court heard.

Charlotte Millward was spared a spell behind bars herself when a judge agreed the 35-year-old acted under extreme pressure in June last year.

Millward, from Northallerton, North Yorkshire, hid ten heroin substitute pills in her bra when she visited her partner in Holme House, Stockton.

Guards saw her hand over the tablets - worth £2 each on the streets but up to £60 each on the black market behind bars - and swooped.

Teesside Crown Court heard how Millward and her family had been seriously threatened in their neighbourhood because of her burglar boyfriend.

Amy Dixon, mitigating, told the court she was no longer with the crook, and was in a new relationship which she is finding "positive and supporting".

"She accepts she acted in an incredibly stupid manner by taking the drugs into prison," said Miss Dixon. "She acted with coercion following threats. She accepts she could have taken a different course of action and contacted the police or alerted the prison staff once she had arrived.

"She states she was absolutely terrified about what might happen not only to her partner but also to herself and her family."

Judge Peter Bowers was told Millward's former partner was stabbed in December, and that she has had to move her children to a secret address.

The judge told her: "Cases like this nearly always result in custody, but I'm going to make an exception. It's quite clear the threat was real."

Millward, who admitted conveying a prohibited article into prison, was given a six-month suspended jail term with probation and 150 hours' unpaid work.

Judge Bowers said: "You had been targeted and felt your children were vulnerable. Those who are ruthless will target vulnerable prisoners and the weak."

He told Millward, of Crosby Road, Northallerton: "The presence of drugs in prison is a real problem which prison authorities are constantly battling against.

"Drugs in prison are used as currency and these Subutex tablets were £2 on the open market outside prison, but worth £40 to £60 each on the inside.

"They are used to get vulnerable prisoners into debt. I accept you were told your partner would be slashed up unless you did what you were told to do."