A DAD-OF-ONE has been jailed after being caught selling drugs to an undercover cop.

Liam Wignall, from Runcorn, was sentenced on Thursday as part of a gang caught by a police operation in Flintshire, North Wales.

Prosecutors say the test purchasing initiative – which ran from the later months of 2021 through to the first half of this year – saw an undercover officer, named "Jimmy," making contact with a county lines operation supplying class A substances into Flintshire, then receiving the drugs from street dealers.

Thirty-year-old Wignall, of Newquay Close in Brookvale, Runcorn, was convicted of five counts of supplying class A substances, two of possessing class A, and one of possessing class B "Jimmy" was sent to Deeside after making a call for heroin, and was directed to walk down a footpath where he found other people waiting.

Two other people then arrived, one of whom was the defendant – who proceeded to sell him heroin.

"Jimmy" placed several more calls in the following days, being sent to Connah's Quay to collect drugs from Wignall.

On December 21, he tried to run after catching the attention of patrolling officers at Deeside – and was found to have class A drugs, as well as a cannabis joint.

Paul Wood, defending, told the court his client had been using drugs since the age of 12 and was under pressure to clear a debt.

The dad-of-one was a forklift truck driver prior to the covid-19 pandemic, he added.

Judge Petts jailed him for three years and eight months.