Depressed Care Worker Stole From Patients At Kingswood Nursing Home

A “DEPRESSED” carer who ripped off £400 from a 94-year-old woman in a Bristol residential home has been handed a suspended jail term.

Elderly Gladys Thompson trusted her financial affairs to her son when she was a resident at Kingswood Court Nursing Home, Bristol Crown Court heard.

When he noticed two cheques had been removed from her cheque book and discovered she had not authorised them, he reported it to police.

Carer Karl Stewart admitted stealing the cheques and paying £400 into his account.

He had targeted another OAP in similar circumstances.

Stewart, 29, of Fishponds Road, Bristol, pleaded guilty to two thefts and two counts of making a false representation.
Handing him a 12-week jail term, suspended for a year, Judge Michael Roach told him: “This was a thoroughly mean thing to do.

“Your depression doesn’t excuse it, it doesn’t even make it explainable. A lot of people are depressed and they don’t prey on the elderly.”

The judge ordered Stewart to be supervised for a year and gave him 80 hours’ unpaid work.

He told him to pay £400 compensation to Barclays Bank after hearing the bank had paid out the money to Mrs Thompson’s family, after she passed away.

Philip Robbins, prosecuting, said around the same time as the thefts, in September last year, Stewart stole a cheque from a house clearance to for £250 and cheques from a 90-year-old resident at the Bluebell Residential Home in Swindon, getting £930.

The court was told he had been handed a 12-week jail term, suspended for a year, at Bristol Magistrates Court in February for those offences.

Mr Robins added Stewart was then caught ripping off Mrs Thompson.

Joanna Lewis, defending, told the court her client was extremely sorry and, having been given the suspended jail term in February, had carried out unpaid work in a charity shop.

She said he had also been engaging with mental health charity Mind and was on medication for depression.

She added her client had attended adult learning classes to improve his English and maths.

Stewart has been struck off from care work by the Nursing Association.