THE youngest member of a gang of Somali crack cocaine dealers who set up business in Worcester has been spared jail.

Adem Benmessahel was only 17 when police raided a house in Lichfield Road, Ronkswood and another in Newtown Road at around 6.35am on April 7 this year, Worcester Crown Court heard.

The three other members of the gang were jailed on Friday after also admitting conspiracy to supply crack cocaine. Kamal Liban, 19, of Leicester was sentenced to three years and four months, Abdlmahad Adow, 20, of London was sentenced to four years and Abdirahim Said, aged 20, was also sentenced to four years.

Police said the drug dealers had connections to London and Leicester and targeted the addresses of vulnerable people in Worcester as they tried to set up a lucrative enterprise anonymously. But their neighbours spotted suspicious activity and raised concerns. In total 18 officers were involved in executing the warrants as part of Operation Lyra.

Crack cocaine and £2,000 in cash were seized in the raids which earned high praise from residents in the block of flats where the dealing was taking place.

Judge Robert Juckes, QC, said it was "with some hesitation" that he had decided to suspend the sentence on Benmessahel, now aged 18.

"The others were not much older than you and you knew what you were involved in," he told Benmessahel. "You are only saved because you were younger."

He was given two years in a young offenders institution suspended for two years with supervision by the probation service. He will also have to undertake 180 hours of unpaid work and be subject to an electronically tagged curfew at an address in Leicester between 7pm and 7am for six months.