A Folkestone bishop has appeared in court and admitted illegally possessing a single-barrelled shotgun.

Comedian-turned-clergyman Jean Gilson-Levi was stopped by Border Officers after having the weapon without a firearms licence.

The gun-totting Bishop said he had declared the 16 gauge gun and ammunition when he travelled from his native Belgium “to do some hunting”.

It was only when 52-year-old Gilson-Levi, of Penfold Road, Folkestone, was returning on August 12 last year that he was stopped and arrested for possessing a Special C16 semi-automatic without a certificate.

After pleading guilty to two charges at Canterbury Crown Court, his lawyer Guy Wyatt asked for sentence to be postponed.

He told Judge Adele Williams: “The defendant is significantly unwell. He had a heart attack five weeks ago.”

Mr Wyatt said that before coming to court, Gilson-Levi – who leads a “miracle crusade” – went to hospital for test which showed his blood pressure 160/112.

“That is, I am led to understand, catastrophically high for someone with a history of heart attacks.”

Judge Williams adjourned the hearing for three weeks and ordered defence lawyers to get an up-to-date medical report.

The judge asked Mr Wyatt: “Why was he in possession of this weapon?”

The lawyer replied: “He hunts in Belgium and had permission to do some shooting in the UK but hadn’t appreciated the difference in the rules.

“He had declared the firearm to the shipping company coming to the UK but when he declared it on the way out, shipping company staff referred him to the Border Agency."

In January last year, he appeared at Crown Court to appeal against a magistrates ruling to suspend his driving licence for twice drive without insurance.

But despite having five months to prepare his case, he failed to produce Belgian documents proving he was insured.

So Judge Nigel Van Der Bijl dismissed the appeal, despite the Bishop’s claims to have emailed the documents to Canterbury Crown Court.

Gilson-Levi is a Belgian-born missionary and founder of the Restored Covenant Churches of God, a Pentecostal apostolic organisation.

Channel Magistrates heard how a police officer on patrol at 3.50pm in October 2013 in Shorncliffe Road, Folkestone spotted a Jeep Cherokee with the registration number “ACT 238”.

The officer tried to stop the vehicle, driven by Gilson-Levi, who then drove into Shorncliffe Crescent where the bishop kept telling the PC he was “a man of the cloth and a good person” and that the officer would “go to hell”.