A teaching assistant has been jailed after she conned £20,000 out of friends by saying that she had terminal cancer.
Ursula Rose, 42, duped colleagues into handing over money from loans and savings to finance Harley Street treatment.
One donor even raided her children's savings after the mother of four told the school she had 'tumours in her head'.
Rose told friends she was going for daily chemotherapy and radiotherapy for aggressive brain tumours - including one allegedly wrapped round a main artery that could kill her at any moment.
Judge Jeremy Gold QC today ordered Rose to pay her victims back £15,000 she still owes.
He said: ‘You were much admired by your colleagues and they believed you when you said you had a brain tumour.
‘This was a gross betrayal of their trust. Good people with the best of intentions were completely taken in by your lies.
'You even forged documents to continue your fraud. Your fraud, I'm afraid to say, must be categorised as calculated and wicked.
‘It makes it all the more sad that you used your effervescent personality to deceive those who trusted you.’
Dressed in black, Rose, who worked at Saint Thomas Becket school in South Norwood, south London, stared blankly ahead as the sentence was read out.
School staff members sat in the public gallery wept and breathed an audible sigh of relief as Rose was led away from the dock in handcuffs.
Fellow teaching assistant Gillian Trype gave her £3,000 - borrowing her two daughters' saving - after Rose convinced her she feared dying on the operating theatre table during a £37,000 private operation.
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Rose took time off work for the 'operation' and when she returned told colleagues it had been partially successful, but a £7,000 American wonder drug could combat the remaining life-threatening tumour.
In June 2009 staff attended a fundraiser at a bar in Croydon, south London, contributing to a collection aimed at raising money for the new drug.
Another colleague, Allison Patmore, gave Rose £6,500 as a deposit on a £40,000 private Harley Street operation after Rose claimed it was too dangerous to be carried out by the NHS.
Mrs Patmore took out a £6,200 loan plus £300 from her own bank account to be repaid when Rose remortgaged her home.
Rose was ordered by the judge at Croydon Crown Court, above, to pay her victims back £15,000 she still owes
The teaching assistant was finally caught out when the school's headmaster, Noel Campbell, received confirmation from Rose's doctor at Mayday University hospital that she never had cancer.
Rose resigned in February, 2010, telling the headmaster she had been given the cancer all-clear and was cured.
Christopher Bertham, defending, told the court that Rose was being hounded for mortgage arrears at the time of the con, suffering from severe migraines and feared for her health.
He said: ‘Mrs Rose expresses shame and regret and has asked me to say that to the court, and that she is sorry for her behaviour.
‘At the time she was operating under not only financial stress but she was stressed gravely about her state of health as well.
‘There is no doubt that the fears and concerns that she had were real enough but her expression of the diagnosis, treatment and prognosis that she told her colleagues did not reflect the truth.’
He said Rose had breached the trust and generosity of her colleagues and that ‘her career has fallen to ashes at her own hand’ as a result of the con.
But speaking outside court today, kind-hearted colleagues caught up in Rose's web of lies said they were relieved to finally see her behind bars.
Teaching assistant Mrs Trype, 54, said: ‘When I first found out I was absolutely mortified. I couldn't believe that somebody could be so deceitful.
‘She has never made eye contact with me, spoken to me or apologised to us.’
Her husband Kevin, 52, an electrician, said: ‘It just goes to show that people can't use the big C to get what they want. Anybody who uses the cancer card deserves jail.
‘There are so many people with cancer who can't get money but they don't go around conning people. I'm glad she got what she got.’
Iona Horwood, a fellow teaching assistant who attended fundraisers for Rose, said: ‘It is very emotional. We are not jumping up and down because because it is a sad event. But justice has been done.’
Rose was sentenced to 18 months each for four counts of fraud, to run concurrently, at Croydon Crown Court. She must serve at least half her sentence behind bars.