A BANK manager who stole more than £250,000 from elderly customers' accounts was tonight starting a three-year prison sentence.

However, trusted Lesley Austin cannot explain what the money - secretly taken over more than six years - was spent on.

A judge at Teesside Crown Court yesterday seemed unable to believe the vast amount of cash could not be accounted for.

He told shamed Austin, 48, of Lockyer Close, Newton Aycliffe, County Durham: "You must have spent it on yourself."

Bespectacled Austin was the manager of the branch of the NatWest in Richmond, North Yorkshire, the court was told.

She took money from the accounts of five customers - some of who were deceased, and the savings were pending probate.

Prosecutor Paul Abrahams said she took advantage of situations to steal as much as she could between 2008 and 2014.

The judge, Recorder James Adkins, told Austin: "You had the ability to move that money and you were in a high degree of trust."

Simon Perkins, mitigating, said Austin, who no longer works for the bank, had been suffering from depression and "cracked" when she stared stealing.

He told the court: "I submit the crack happened a long time ago and this offending is a feature of that.

"She may well have been suffering from depression or undue stress from her employment and her private life."

Austin admitted a total of nine charges of theft and six of false accounting amounting to £267,000.
Mr Perkins said the banking collapse seven years ago and "ever-increasing financial targets" took their toll.

"She was holding down this work while caring for a young son who suffers from some difficulties," he said.

"There should be some recognition of the stresses and the strains of her home life . . . she is not a threat to another soul on this earth.

"She has not enjoyed anything like the unqualified support of her husband and the father of her child."
The judge told Austin: "The offending continued over some period.

"Depression does not justify the plundering of those bank accounts in the way that you did."

It is understood that she stole £120,000 from one victim, an elderly man from Richmond, who has since died.

Another alleged victim was a 54-year-old Richmond man who lost £75,000 in three thefts of £25,000 each.

An elderly Northallerton woman also lost £24,000 and a female pensioner from Richmond lost £9,500.

Prosecutors said that Austin, who was arrested by North Yorkshire Police last September, took the money in 28 transactions.