A TANNING salon boss has been jailed after using his £650,000 property to house a drugs farm.

Norman King, aged 42, also used fake payslips to secure a mortgage for The Bungalow on Tannery Lane, Penketh, with help from co-defendant Karen Silcock.

King, who previously owned a series of tanning salons, pleaded guilty to the production of cannabis and fraud.

Warrington Crown Court heard on Friday how the cannabis farm was uncovered by police in August 2009.

Around 200 plants were discovered in three rooms of a barn behind the bungalow.

More than 11kg of cannabis was recovered by police with a street value of £55,000.

Defending, Michael Scholes said that King did not realise the scale of the cannabis operation set up in his home That raid led officers to uncover his deceit in mortgage dealings with the Royal Bank of Scotland after a string of missed payments.

Repossession proceedings for his home began in 2007 but King borrowed £299,000 from a private finance company in Monaco.

He paid £258,000 to block repossession of his home and kept the remaining £41,000.

The court heard how King then persuaded Salford resident Silcock, aged 38, to register The Bungalow in her name to obtain another mortgage.

She and King used fake payslips from UK Car and Van Solutions that said they earned a combined annual salary of £181,000.

Police contacted the company and the scam was discovered, the court heard. However, the ruse worked and a mortgage was given for £475,000. King used the cash to pay existing loans.

Silcock then used more false documents to get another £80,000 loan with the cash deposited into two Lloyds bank accounts belonging to each defendant.

King had cards for both and home in Spain, but both would ‘dip into the account’, according to Merion Lewis-Jones, prosecuting.

The court heard that Silcock had made the false representations as a favour, and was paid £4,000 for it.

Judge Nicholas Woodward sentenced King to 21 months for producing cannabis and three months for fraud, the sentences to run consecutively.

Silcock was handed a curfew order.

The house on Tannery Lane has now been re-sold.