A CARER from Bentham who admitted stealing £10,240 from a vulnerable, house bound woman has been jailed for eight months.

Carolyn Kay, 45, was sentenced at Bradford Crown Court on Friday, November 29, after pleading guilty at Skipton Magistrates’ Court on November 8.

She admitted one charge of theft from a person at numerous locations to the value of £10,240, between August 30, 2018 and January 10 this year.

Kay, of Mount Pleasant, High Bentham, had cared for the 58 year old woman for about five months after responding to her advert posted on Facebook.

The court heard the woman, who has agoraphobia and depression, is house-bound, and confined to her bed, employed Kay towards the end of the summer, last year, because she was local and was a carer for her own mother.

She agreed to pay Kay £10 per hour and also £1,000 to be paid in advance to pay off a debt, for which she gave the woman her bank card and Personal Identification Number (PIN) said Martin Butterworth, prosecuting.

The woman mislaid her card for a while and when she found it again in January this year discovered there had been 51 unauthorised withdrawals from her bank since the previous September.

They included cash withdrawals from ATM machines, also online, and shop purchases and in early September, cash had also been withdrawn in Spain when the complainant was in hospital, said Mr Butterworth.

Kay was also ordered to pay a surcharge of £140.

A mention for a Proceeds of Crime hearing will take place on December 19.