Bromsgrove care home worker found guilty of stealing cash (From Bromsgrove Advertiser)

Bromsgrove care home worker found guilty of stealing cash

10:16am Friday 14th September 2012 in News

A 53-YEAR-OLD Bromsgrove care home worker has been found guilty of stealing a £10 note from a resident's room which had been put there by police.

Lead carer Jane Sutton was caught on CCTV after police were called in to Breme House in Providence Road to put in decoys after a spate of thefts.

Staff at the home, which specialises in caring for people with dementia, had been told by management that Room 207 was temporarily vacant but that an elderly woman was due to move in, said Siobhan Collins, prosecuting at Worcester Crown Court.

Staff were told the woman's family were putting in her personal possessions ready for her arrival but the items, including jewellery and cash, had been put there by police.

Miss Collins said Sutton, employed at the home since September 2003, went into room 207 five times over a four-day period last year searching through possessions placed there by police.

She stole the note on July 30 from the pocket of a coat hanging on a wardrobe though there was no suggestion she was responsible for any other thefts.

Sutton, of Littleheath Lane, Lickey End, denied theft.

Defending herself, she said she had gone into the room because she had heard a bang and went to investigate.

Sutton said she took the note and put it in an envelope in an office drawer for safe keeping.

The envelope was never found.

She told the jury she had been a care worker for 23 years and went out of her way to give extra help to the elderly people she was looking after.

She said she had now lost her job and her only occupation was looking after her grandchildren.

Judge Patrick Thomas gave her "house imprisonment" of two months electronically tagged curfew from 8pm-6am.

He said it was more of a punishment that she had lost her job and the criminal offence was likely to mean she would find it difficult to find another one.