A COUPLE who plundered almost £30,000 from a vulnerable elderly widow after stealing her chequebook have each been jailed for two years.

Carl Potter and Jodie Thompson wrote out the documents for ever increasing amounts to spend on themselves until the victim ran out of cash.

The couple splashed out on gadgets, jewellery and clothes, much of was later found in the room they shared at her family home.

Despite admitting fraud at Swindon Crown Court, Thompson claimed she knew little about what her then partner of three years Potter, 27, was up to.

But after hearing the 25-year-old give evidence Judge Robert Pawson said she had ‘lied throughout’ and found they were ‘in it together from the start’.

Alexander West, prosecuting, said the couple had visited the old lady’s Parks home in June last year to watch an England football game on the television.

He said Potter knew that the woman, who has mental health issues and is in her sixties, had recently come into an £80,000 inheritance.

While they were there the victim spotted him moving her handbag but hadn’t noticed her chequebook was missing until the bank contacted her in September.

By then it was found that £29,450 had been withdrawn in eight cheques which were paid into two of Thompson’s accounts.

The first two, for £250 and £550 cleared in her Halifax account on July 13 last year with a further for £1,000 a week later.

Another week after £2,500 went into her Barclays savings account then £5,550 a week after, £8,550 about 12 days later then another £8,550 another 12 days after.

When police went to their home they found an array of electronics including a laptop, iPhone, tablet, expensive charger and computer games.

They also found hundreds of pounds worth of Pandora jewellery bought in seven visits to the shop during the two months of crime.

Although Thompson would claim she was put under pressure by her boyfriend, from whom she has now split, the court saw CCTV from a trip to Barclays.

In the footage the pair are seen to withdraw £1,000 the day after one of the stolen cheque cleared and sit down in the foyer dividing up the notes.

The court heard that as a result of the stress caused by the offending the victim became a recluse and was sectioned for six weeks under the Mental Health Act.

Potter, of Knowsley Road, and Thompson, of Mulberry Grove, pleaded guilty to fraud between the end of June and Tuesday, September 6, last year.

Peter Binder, for Thompson, said she suffered dyslexia and had a statement of special educational needs when she was at school.

Although her evidence had been rejected he insisted that she was the ‘patsy’ playing the lesser role and had never been in trouble with the police before.

He said it was not a sophisticated crime and she was always bound to be found out, adding half of the cash was recovered.

Mike Jeary, for Potter, said he and his family had lost a friend in the victim and he was sorry for what he had done.

Passing sentence the judge said: “She was awarded a significant amount in inheritance paid into her account in March or April 2016. She was defrauded of that money by you two acting, as I say, together.

“I have taken in everything I have read in the presentence report and everything I have heard about you and I am afraid given the impact on the victim it seems to me with a heavy heart, but being as intellectually honest as I can, I can’t suspend those sentences.

"Each of you will serve two years in custody.”