Cleaner steals €43,000 from bank card belonging to 77-year-old man

A cleaner who befriended a 77-year-old man before stealing €43,000 from him over several months was yesterday given a suspended jail term and ordered to pay the sum back within six months.

Rita Mifsud, 46, of Birkirkara, was distraught as she stood in the dock holding her head and shaking when the police inspector read out the charges. She pleaded guilty to stealing the money and defrauding the elderly man.

Police Inspector Edmond Cuschieri told the court the man had given the cleaner access to his post office box key to collect his mail.

The woman knew he had asked for a bank card and kept it when it arrived in the mail, using it to make 96 withdrawals between March 4 and last Saturday, raking up a total of €43,100.

The discrepancy was only picked up by a relative of the elderly man last week.

Ms Mifsud had already returned €7,820 but her defence lawyer, Chris Cardona, told Magistrate Silvio Meli his client was a very sick woman who had stopped working and, therefore, needed an extension over the statutory six months usually given for someone to pay money back. The accused told the court she had only stolen from the man because she was in financial dire straits and needed to provide for her children.

However, lawyer Jovan Debono, appearing for the elderly man, insisted on the amount being paid back within six months and the magistrate retired to his chambers to consider punishment.

On returning, he jailed the woman for two years suspen-ded for four and ordered her to repay within six months, warning that there would be consequences if she failed to do so.