A simple get avatar function

[eluser]Iwasignited[/eluser]
Hello everyone.
Its me again.
This time, I have a question.
I wrote:

Code:

function getAvatar($userid)
    {
        $extensions = array('.jpeg', '.jpg', '.png', '.gif');
        foreach ($extensions as $extension)
        {
            $check_this_name = $userid.$extension;
            $dest = ''. base_url() .'avatars/'. $check_this_name .'';
            if (file_exists($dest))
            {
                $filename = $check_this_name;
            }
        }
        if (!isset($filename))
        {
            $filename = 'noavatar.png';
        }
        return $filename;
    }

in my avatars folder, I placed a file named 5.jpg but my user whose userid = 5 (a test one) always receives 'noavatar.png' as the avatar.

Please let me know what Im doing wrong.

Thank you all.