A care worker and her partner used a vulnerable woman’s bank details to fleece her of thousands of pounds in Burnley.

Prosecutor Eleanor Durdy told Bradford Crown Court that Donna Marie Glover, 47, and Melanie Foulger, 41, blew more than £4,000 of the victim’s money over more than two years in a sustained offence of fraud.

Foulger also set up a fake PayPal account using the victim’s details and later successfully applied for a £50,000 Covid bounce back loan from the government in connection with a tattooing and tanning business that did not exist.

They have now been told to repay the money they stole from the victim, but have avoided jail.

Miss Durdy said Glover, also known as Donna McCann, and Foulger were in a relationship at the time the offences started and lived together at Bracken Bank Grove in Keighley.

Glover was employed at a care home in Burnley in 2017 where she was the key support worker for a vulnerable woman who needed assistance with her banking.

She left the facility without notice in October 2018.

On May 4, 2020, a parcel addressed to the victim was delivered to the care home. It was found to contain two t-shirts.

An investigation ultimately revealed 118 separate payments totalling fraudulent spending of £4,336 between April 9, 2018, and May 22, 2020, with 70 purchases totalling £2,561 made between the four weeks between April 7 and May 4, 2020.

Multiple purchases had been made using the woman’s bank details and items had been sent to Glover’s home address.

Miss Durdy said: “These transactions had been made without the victim’s knowledge, permission or capacity to provide consent.”

Lancashire Telegraph: Bradford Crown Court Bradford Crown Court (Image: Newsquest)

A PayPal account had also been set up using a mobile phone registered in the victim’s name, but the SIM card attributed to it was delivered to Foulger at Bracken Bank Grove.

The same address was also linked to multiple other purchases with payments corresponding to amounts taken from her account.

Glover was arrested on June 8, 2020, at the home she shared with Foulger. She admitted ordering some items on the victim’s account “to make her home look nicer” but claimed she had intended to repay the money.

Among the evidence found during a search of the house were mobile phones, receipts, and a black book containing email addresses and phone numbers used to buy items using the victim’s account.

Foulger was arrested on August 19, 2020. She later admitted finding the victim’s card details on Glover’s phone and “got carried away”, claiming some transactions were “accidental”.

Police also seized two cans of PAVA irritant spray, which is a prohibited weapon under the Firearms Act, from the women’s home.

She later pleaded guilty to fraud and possession of an offensive weapon.

During the fraud investigation officers discovered a further fraud involving Foulger who had set up a fake tattooing and tanning business in her name from her home address with an estimated turnover of £210,000.

The account was subsequently used to apply for a government bounce back loan during the Covid pandemic and received £50,000 despite there being no proof that the company existed.

Almost all the money was transferred out of the account by September 10 that year with only one payment of £10 being made into the account between June and September.

Among the amounts transferred was £4,000 into a Lloyds Bank account and £6,990 into a HSBC account.

In interview, Foulger said she had been pressured into opening the account and had kept £8,400 to pay off a drug debt.

Mitigating for Glover, of Edgworth Grove, Burnley, Joe Culley said the fraud had been committed during a “turbulent” period in her life during which she had lost her career.

Mitigating for Foulger, of Bracken Bank Grove, Keighley, Umar Shahzad said she accepted her actions had been “inappropriate and unacceptable” and was “deeply ashamed”.

Sentencing Glover and Foulger, Recorder Simon Kealey KC said Glover was in a position of trust and responsibility when she defrauded the “particularly vulnerable victim”.

He told Foulger her company “had never really existed” and the grant money was transferred out of the account “within a very short period of time”.

He sentenced each woman to a total of 12 months imprisonment suspended for two years, plus 15 rehabilitation activity requirement days.

He also ordered them to compensate the victim by repaying £2,168 each at a rate of £5 per week.