A PROLIFIC burglar has received a two-year jail sentence at Bolton Crown Court after coming clean about a catalogue of offences dating back more than 10 years.

In May last year Clinton Flynn, of no fixed address, was jailed for 44 months for house burglary.

But Bolton Crown Court heard that he then contacted police officers from "Operation Clean Slate" and confessed to four further house burglaries in the town in 2012 and 2013, two theft offences, and asked for 17 more burglaries and thefts to be taken into consideration.

During the house break-ins in McDonna Street, Norton Street and Old Road, Halliwell, he stole electrical goods and jewellery, and Graham Robinson, prosecuting, added that the crimes would have remained unsolved if Flynn had not confessed.

Kimberley Morton, defending, said Flynn had written a letter to the court expressing his shame.

She said: “His life has been blighted by drugs and that’s the sole reason for committing the offences.”

Judge Timothy Stead said he accepted 36-year-old Flynn wanted to change.

He added: “He is actually starting to think about the distress of others which he hadn’t done beforehand.”

The judge said, in sentencing Flynn, he had to take into account public feelings about house burglaries, but added that had the defendant admitted the additional offences when he was jailed last year, the total sentence would not have been much more than the term he is already serving.

The two-year sentence will run alongside the prison sentence Flynn is already serving.