Portsmouth Kinder Egg drug dealer jailed after getting caught for third time with knuckle duster having returned from "fishing trip"

Andrew Lewis was warned by a judge in July he was on his “last chance” when he was spared jail and handed a two-year prison term suspended for the same period at Portsmouth Crown Court.

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The 32-year-old had been ambushed by suspicious police on Gunwharf Road, near Gunwharf Quays, around 4pm on April 14 before crack cocaine, heroin and a knuckle duster were found on him. The drugs were in a Kinder Egg.

Judge, Recorder Tom Brown, said at the time: “This really is the last chance (before going to jail). I hope you make the best of it.”

But Lewis, of Estella Road, was unable to reward the judge’s leniency with him back in trouble when he was stopped by police at a city petrol station on September 20 and found with a knuckle duster - the third time he has been found with such a weapon.

The court heard Lewis had been on a 48-hour fishing trip with his partner, who was in the car, when police approached the vehicle. The defendant admitted having cannabis on him before a search of a blue man bag revealed the knuckle duster, apparently given to him sentimentally by his grandfather. “I use it when I’m fishing,” he told officers, before adding: “I should have taken it out.”

Daniel Reilly, defending, said Lewis had struggled after losing his third sibling to cancer in late 2022. Referring to being caught with a knuckle duster, the barrister said: “He understands he should not be in possession of it. But he was unaware he had it in his blue man bag.”

Judge Robert Hill said there were no “unjust” reasons why the suspended sentence should not be activated. A statutory minimum term of six months also had to be applied after Lewis admitted possession of an offensive weapon. “This is the third time you have been caught in possession of an offensive weapon,” the judge said.

Judge Hill activated the two-year jail term but made the six-month blade offence run concurrently, meaning he would not spend any longer behind bars than two years. Lewis also admitted possession of cannabis.