A mum who was caught supplying drugs to her serving prisoner son via inmates on day release has been ordered to pay back £14,000 – despite the narcotics being worth just a fraction of that amount.

Cambs Times: Daniel Robertson, was jailed for three years after pleading guilty to two counts of being concerned in the supply of a controlled drug.Daniel Robertson, was jailed for three years after pleading guilty to two counts of being concerned in the supply of a controlled drug. (Image: Archant)

Alicia Robertson, 53, of High Street, Chatteris, was jailed for 14 months in October after she admitted handing cannabis and ketamine to inmates while they worked at a Huntingdon school on day release.

Now she has been ordered to hand over the £13,690 cash which was found in her Chatteris home at the time of her arrest.

Her son Daniel Robertson, who was already serving seven years for an armed robbery in Chatteris, was given a further three years for his role in the affair.

Despite initially contesting that the cash was from legitimate sources, she eventually conceded that she was unable to give a viable explanation for where it had come from. She was judged to have benefitted by a total of £14,101 from crime.

Economic Crime Unit manager, Paul Prosser said: “Our investigations showed a number of deposits into her bank account which she could not explain.

“Despite the seized drugs only having a street value of around £550, Alicia Robertson has ended up paying around 25 times that amount thanks to the Proceeds of Crime Act.

“This should send a clear message that we will do everything in our powers to pursue criminals to ensure they do not benefit through their crime. In fact they may find themselves even worse off that when they started.”

The two prisoners handed drugs to take into Littlehey Prison were also jailed - Saxon Gamblin for 14 months and Matthew Spice for eight weeks.

Gamblin and Spice were searched when they got back to the prison and were discovered to have packages of ketamine and cannabis hidden inside them.

Police arrested Robertson at her home where she was found to have £13,690 in her bedroom.

Other packages of drugs were later discovered hidden in the school grounds.

Pills which could have been passed off as steroids were also discovered.

The seized cannabis had a total prison value of £3,885 while the steroids and ketamine could have been sold for more than £300 in prison.

Both Robertson and an accomplice David Caley were jailed last year after admitting to robbing a Chatteris shopkeeper at gunpoint on October 31, 2011.

Robertson pointed a shotgun at the shopkeeper whilst Caley drove the getaway car. An unknown accomplice was never traced

Robertson, of Chatteris, pointed a pump-action shotgun at the shopkeeper whilst an accomplice used a pistol to terrorise the shopkeeper to steal £300 from the till plus £250 worth of cigarettes.

Robertson was jailed for seven years and Caley for seven and a half years and each was given five months extra for possession of guns. The weapons were never recovered.