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A sickly grandmother in her seventies was found guilty of smuggling almost £1m worth of cocaine into the UK through the Port of Dover, in her mobility vehicle.

Ambrozine Heron, 77, was jailed for 13 years, while her daughter, Paulette Chambers, 49, was sentenced to 14 years in prison.

Customs officers at Dover found 16kg of cocaine in Heron's specially-adapted Nissan Pathfinder after they stopped the car as it arrived from France in March, Canterbury Crown Court heard.

The pensioner from Smethwick, West Midlands, who suffers from diabetes, asthma and hypertension, had made 14 other similar trips to the continent with her daughter and was likely to have smuggled drugs, the jury heard.

Sentencing, Judge Adele Williams told Heron: "I have no doubt that your role in the car was to add some respectability to the journey in respect of your age and your ill health."