A WOMAN who stole almost £8,000 from her employer to feed a drug habit was told by magistrates yesterday she had only escaped prison by the narrowest of margins.

Sophie Wilbor, 20, of Thirsk Road, Northallerton, North Yorkshire, admitted six charges of theft and three of false accounting when she first appeared before magistrates last month. She also asked for 27 similar offences to be taken into consideration.

Her case was adjourned for reports until yesterday, when she appeared before the bench in Richmond for sentencing.

After deliberating for an hour, magistrates imposed a 240-hour community punishment order, and instructed Wilbor to pay £7,935 compensation and prosecution costs of £120.

Magistrates told her that her apparent remorse, her guilty pleas and the fact she had not tried to blame anyone else had all helped to save her from a prison term.

Valerie McMinn, prosecuting, told the court, at the time of the offences between February 2002 and January this year, Wilbor worked for Gale and Phillipson, of Northallerton, which acts as an agent for the Nationwide building society.

Needing money to feed a cocaine habit, Wilbor forged withdrawal slips so she could take money from customers' accounts, although she sometimes moved cash from one to another in an attempt to cover her tracks.

But one customer noticed a discrepancy and, after Wilbor was questioned about the missing money, she broke down and confessed to what she had been doing.

Peter Bradford, mitigating, said that Wilbor co-operated fully with the police and had gone to great lengths to get her life back in order, severing links with a boyfriend who had led her into drugs, shunning narcotics, moving back in with her family and trying to make a fresh start.