A CARER who stole thousands of pounds from an 86-year-old widower she was looking after has been jailed for nine months.

Susan Carter plundered the bank account of elderly Ivor Coates to fund family holidays and finance her gambling habit with numerous trips to the bingo and lottery playing.

The 60-year-old admitted much of the money was 'frittered away on bingo, the lottery, anything I thought I could win money on' when she was questioned by police.

But even when she won anything rather than paying back what she had taken she used the cash so she and her husband could sun themselves on a Greek island.

Carter, who used to be married to the victim's nephew, used her position of having power of attorney on Mr Coates' bank accounts to repeatedly steal from him.

Philip Warren, prosecuting, told Swindon crown court that Carter had taken on the role of carer for Mr Coates as he grew older.

He said that as the old man's mental health deteriorated he was moved to a care home and it was arranged that Carter would look after his finances.

She was also made executrix of his will and stood to inherit 35 per cent of his estate when he died.

After he left his home the house was sold for more than £132,000 and the money put into a bank account while a building society account also contained about £5,000 cash.

Mr Warren said Carter then proceeded to help herself to the building society money, topping it up from the bank account when it ran low.

He told the court that during a four week period in June 2003 Carter made seven separate cash withdrawals each of £500.

In the weeks than followed she then took a further £2,100 in various withdrawals and then another four sets of £500 were taken in cash over two weeks in October 2003.

And in January 2004, shortly before her arrest, five lots of £500 were withdrawn in cash by her.

She also made out cheques to herself to pay off her overdraft and buy Christmas food and presents for her family.

Carter, of Gate Farm, Stanley, Chippenham, pleaded guilty to theft of £17,500.

Sarah Regan, defending, said that the ironic part of the case was that a lot of the money she had taken was in fact her inheritance, which she did not know about.

She said that her client had been the only person to care for Mr Coates and visited him four times a week and had him over at her house on many weekends.

Miss Regan said that her client was full of sorrow and remorse for what she had done and had arranged to borrow the money to repay Mr Coates.

She said "She also had to accept that she used the money to support a rather unsavoury gambling habit. Something she had kept from her children and family.

"It was something she got caught up in and couldn't help herself. She was taking money to try and catch up on what she had lost."

Jailing her Judge Longbotham said "Those in a position of trust of and elderly and vulnerable victim and take advantage and steal from him."

Jamie Hill