A CARE worker stole from a frail pensioner after being trusted to withdraw cash from the 88-year-old's bank account.

Melanie Durrant is facing jail after being convicted by a jury at Cambridge Crown Court of four charges of stealing from vulnerable Joan Ayres while working for her at sheltered accommodation in the city two years ago.

Durrant, 34, of Campkin Road, Cambridge, was cleared of carrying out three further thefts from her victim.

It can now be revealed that Durrant, daughter of a policeman, was acquitted last year of thieving from another elderly, ailing woman she was employed to help care for. Details of that case were ordered to be kept out of the press until the latest trial was over.

A single mother in debt, Durrant helped herself to cash when asked to withdraw some of Mrs Ayres pension from a post office account using her cashcard and PIN, the court was told.

The thefts, which began soon after Durrant began working in the £10 an hour job at Mrs Ayres' home at Rackham Close, were noticed when the warden checked the pensioner's bank statements for her.

The court heard that Mrs Ayres, who was too frail to attend the trial and gave evidence from her own front room via video link, normally withdrew around £200 a month for her needs. But after Durrant was entrusted with the withdrawals in early summer 2005, £1,000 was removed in June and £1,150 in July.

"This was considerably more than had been removed from the account before. It may well be that Melanie Durrant gave this elderly lady some of the money but certainly not all of it," said Michael Procter, for the prosecution.

Durrant, who had been convicted as a 17-year-old of plundering savings from customers' accounts - and the till - at a local building society where she was employed at the time, the jury learned, denied stealing from Mrs Ayres.

Arrested in August 2005, she claimed she had alerted Mrs Ayres' daughter, who lives in Guernsey, over her concern that the 'forgetful' pensioner was taking out large amounts of cash from her account.

This conversation was disputed, and the prosecution maintained Durrant was trying to cover her tracks.

Sentence on the dishonest care worker was adjourned until early next month to await probation reports, and she was warned that all options - including prison - remain a possibility.
Cambridge Evening News Report 04/Sept/2007