Skip to content

Mum used Kinder eggs to smuggle drugs into Berwyn prison

BBC Kinder eggBBC

A woman who used Kinder eggs to try and smuggle drugs into the UK's largest prison has been jailed.

Mother-of-two Chelsea Bennion, 28, tried to pass the containers, which usually contain toys, to a prisoner she was visiting at HMP Berwyn, in Wrexham, in October 2018.

The two eggs contained 99 tablets of buprenorphine, which is a heroin substitute used to treat addiction.

Bennion, from Wrexham, was jailed for 30 weeks at Mold Crown Court.

The court heard there were problems with drug use within the prison, which is designed to house 2,106 men, including assaults, gang culture and inmates getting into drug debt.

A prison guard became suspicious and found the two eggs - one containing 50 of the tablets and the other 49 - hidden in the leg of the prisoner's trousers.

HMP Berwyn prison wing showing a long corridor with closed cell doors
Chelsea Bennion, whose court hearing had been delayed, was sentenced to 30 weeks in prison

Bennion was under supervision at the time after being released from prison for supplying cannabis, but said that during the delay in getting her case to court she had turned her life around.

Judge Rhys Rowlands said while she had pleaded guilty and there had been a delay in her case, she needed to go to prison to act as a deterrent to others.

He said: "People need to realise that if they take drugs into prison then consequences will follow."

Prisoner Ryan Wolfe, from Nuneaton, Warwickshire, who was already serving a six year sentence for assault with intent to rob, received an additional eight months for his role.