A Canterbury heroin addict has told a judge that being locked up in prison has saved his life.

Serial burglar Benji Worton (pictured right) had returned to crime to fund his life-threatening drugs habit.

The 30-year-old had targeted the homes of university students in Canterbury and then raided them while they were away for Christmas.

However, the second-hand car dealer claimed being kept inside jail on remand awaiting sentence had stopped him from killing himself.

Canterbury Crown Court heard how Worton ransacked four homes in the street where he lived, Downs Road, to get cash to buy heroin.

He claimed he had been dealt "a cruel hand", suffering a series of catastrophic events including the violent deaths of his father and brother in separate incidents.

His barrister, Philip Rowley, told Judge James O'Mahony: "His remand in custody has saved his life because he was well on his way to killing himself until he was arrested.

"Now, having cleaned himself up, he is committed to staying drug free when he is released."

Mr Rowley told how two months after the death of his father, a close pal of Worton, Luke Brocklebank, was murdered.

"i recognise the misery caused by the loss of your friends and family, but being the victim of burglary is also a ghastly experience..." – judge james o'mahony

In September 2009 another close friend died in a car accident, "bringing trauma upon trauma", Mr Rowley told the court.

The next year, his seven-month-old niece died from meningitis and in January last year his older brother was killed in Manchester.

Worton wept as Mr Rowley catalogued the tragedies, saying he had then returned to taking heroin to cope and needed cash to fund his habit.

However, the judge - in jailing him for 40 months after he admitted four burglaries - told him: "You deliberately targeted the homes of students in your street.

"Then you broke in and smashed property to get inside the flats and there stole the private possessions of those who probably don't have a lot of money, and you did it to fund your own heroin addiction.

"You did this after suffering a catalogue of family bereavements and anyone hearing that would have been moved to sympathy.

"I recognise the misery caused by the loss of your friends and family, but being the victim of burglary is also a ghastly experience.

"Those who have suffered greatly themselves should not inflict that misery on others."

Benji Worton's brother Ed (pictured) died after being repeatedly hit around the head with a pickaxe

Jim Harvey, prosecuting, had told Canterbury Crown Court how on December 18 last year one student returned to discover his home had been raided and a fanlight ripped from its hinges.

Police traced the break-in to Worton after he left a shoe impression in dirt on one of the chairs.

Worton forced his way into another flat on December 27 through a patio before kicking open an internal door.

He was later arrested and admitted to two more burglaries after taking part in a police campaign known as Operation Cleanslate.

Ed Worton, 31, died after he was repeatedly hit around the head with a pickaxe handle by Arron Ward, 28, after a row about the weather. Mr Worton had just become a father to twins Edward and Poppy.

Ed and Benji’s father father Ted Worton, a 52-year-old former miner was battered with a mallet and left to die at his Ramsgate flat in 2009.

Luke Brocklebank, 26, was attacked near Sturry Road and stabbed to death.