A PROLIFIC shoplifter with a “dismal” criminal record who repeatedly flouted a ban on entering any Co-op stores has been jailed for two years.

Robert Canning, 38, was given a five-year Criminal Behaviour Order (CBO) in December 2015, having served a brief prison sentence for a series of shop thefts.

The order banned him from entering Co-op stores, but Canning continued to offend and appeared at Bradford Crown Court in relation to two further counts of shoplifting from November 2016 and February this year.

The court had previously heard that Canning, of Freshfield Gardens, Allerton, had committed his offending to fund his Class A drug addiction.

Police said that having been released from prison in October last year, Canning entered the Co-op store in the Allerton area of Bradford on November 21 and stole confectionery items.

On February 15 this year, the day before he was due at court, he went into the Co-op store in Thornton and stole some meat.

Both thefts constituted breaches of Canning’s CBO, and he had pleaded guilty to all offences at an earlier hearing.

Jayne Beckett, for Canning, said her client would be willing to complete a drug rehabilitation order, having previously been unwilling to do so.

But sentencing Canning, The Recorder of Bradford, Judge Roger Thomas QC, told him: “You have a long, unsatisfactory, and dismal offending history driven by drugs. You are constantly stealing from Co-op stores, in fact you were caught red-handed in the Thornton store the day before you were due to appear at a hearing in this court.

“On your last appearance I asked the probation service for a report, but it seems they feel you are beyond their grasp and the only way forward is to pass a custodial sentence.”

After the sentencing, PC Diane Walsh from the Bradford District Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) Team, said: “A CBO is a prohibitive order and is meant to help prolific offenders like Canning from committing further offences. Breaches of these orders carry a maximum sentence of five years, and as can be seen by this excellent result, the courts take a dim view of people who do not adhere to them.”