Carer who robbed stroke victim of his £13,000 life savings and money set aside to pay for inscription on his blank gravestone avoids jail
A carer who fleeced a stroke victim of his £13,000 life savings leaving nothing to pay for his funeral has been spared jail today.
Belinda Dent, 44, emptied the bank account of David Lewis, 68, for whom she was meant to be caring.
The 'despicable' theft was only discovered when Mr Lewis died in October 2010.
It turned out that Dent emptied his bank account then transferred money from his ISA into that account so that she could steal that as well.
The money in the ISA had been to pay for his funeral expenses.
The thefts - described as a breach of trust - meant that the trustee of his will had to pay for the funeral out of his own pocket and his gravestone has still not been inscribed because there is no money left to do it.
The court heard that since the offence, again while working as a carer Dent had received a suspended sentence for stealing more than £500 from a 92-year-old client.
In December Dent, of Ffordd Canton in Bagillt, Wales, admitted stealing £13,000 from Mr Lewis while caring for him at his home in Prestatyn.
Sentence had been deferred for six months to see if she could come up with compensation money.
Judge Niclas Parry, who described the theft as 'despicable', gave Dent six months to raise funds to pay some of the money back to her victim.
But he accepted that she had not thrown that chance back in his face and that genuine attempts had been made to raise the money.
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Since then she had lost her home, her car and her job, she was caring for her disabled husband and her very sick father, and her teenage daughter also relied upon her.
The judge said that in the circumstances, the court could show compassion and he said he would pass a 12 month prison sentence suspended for 16 months. But he ordered her to repay the full amount of £13,300 at £250 a month.
Betrayal: Judge Parry, sitting at Mold Crown Court, pictured, said Dent systematically and repeatedly stole in such a breach of trustJudge Parry, sitting at Mold Crown Court, told Dent, who wept throughout much of the proceedings: 'This serious and quite despicable matter involved the theft of more than £13,000 in breach of a high degree of trust.
'Your victim, the victim of a stroke, required daily assistance with all personal care and by the time Cambrian Home Care Ltd began to care for him, his physical condition meant had deteriorated and he was prone to confusion. This person had cared for his finances and had worked hard.
'After he had been targeted by you, his finances were in such a state that that the trustee found that he could not even finance his gravestone to be engraved. To this day it remains un-engraved.'
At the time she was a woman of good character but having stolen £13,000 in October 2010, she went on to steal from another person in her care five months later.
The judge said that those who systematically and repeatedly stole in such a breach of trust had to receive prison sentences. 'You only stopped when there was no money left,' he said.
'Any right minded person would be sickened by what you have done.'
But she had pleaded guilty, he accepted that she was truly remorseful, and he told her: 'You are ruined.
'You have lost your home, lost your car, lost your job and lost your reputation. Despite all of that your strong work ethic remains.
'You remain a fighter for your family. I accept that you were driven not by greed but by your desperation to address financial problems that were not of your making.'
When sentencing, the judge was asked to bear in mind that Dent had been caring for husband who was disabled following a work related accident.
Kate Meredith-Jones, defending, said that while in a reference her employers had said they would stand by her, they had not provided her with any work since.
