A young drug addict who has thrown away chances to reform and help by three social agencies was yesterday jailed for seven months after blatantly disobeying the probation officer.

Ilona Bartolo, 23, of Pietà had been placed on probation for three years after admitting to being in possession of heroin in quantities indicating it was not for her exclusive use. She had been warned that if she disobeyed her probation officer she would be jailed.

Mr Justice David Scicluna said in his judgment that, from the outset, Ms Bartolo did not have the motivation to complete a drug rehabilitation programme and after joining a residential programme in Gozo, run by the Oasi Foundation, she was quickly thrown out for not sticking to the rules.

She was subsequently placed in a Sedqa residential programme after spending some time at Mount Carmel Hospital.

She left the programme together with her boyfriend, Kurtis Bakoush, a man with a colourful criminal record, and refused to live with her parents, going to live with him instead and almost immediately started using heroin again.

The judge said that despite all the help given to her by her parents and three social agencies – Oasi, Sedqa and Caritas (which also assisted her) – she ignored everyone and even informed her psychiatrist that she did not want to do any type of drug rehabilitation programme.