A Mid Wales woman stole more than £9,000 from a post office where she worked in a desperate bid to keep the pub she was running stay afloat, a court has heard.

Elizabeth Porter and her husband had been running the sub post office at Trefeglwys near Llanidloes, for another man who was operating four outreach sub post offices in Powys.

Porter, of The Red Lion in Trefeglwys, admitted a theft charge when she appeared at Mold Crown Court yesterday.

The 29-year-old escaped immediate custody and received a 36-week prison sentence, suspended for 12 months, as well as being ordered to carry out 200 hours unpaid work.

Judge Niclas Parry said that she was a woman of previous good character.

She was running a pub and a post office and she took money from one to put into the other, he said.

“It was a serious matter which crossed the custody threshold, but in all the circumstances the sentence could be suspended,” he said.

Mrs Caroline Harris, prosecuting, said that the £9,182 was taken between January and April last year.

The operator, Kulwant Singh Nijjer, received a telephone call from a lady who ran the premises before him, telling him that there was no money in the safe.

The operator was concerned, contacted Porter and said that he would be coming over to the post office to check the financial balance.

Initially Porter was fine with that but later claimed there had been a robbery, Mrs Harris said.

The court heard he challenged her, and she asked: “Am I going to go to prison for this?”

She later claimed to the police that £1,500 had been taken in a burglary but then admitted that she had taken the money, intending to pay it back.

When interviewed by police, Porter said that she believed that she had taken about £2,000.

She explained that she and her husband were struggling to run a pub as well and were finding it difficult to pay the bills.

Mr Dean Easthope, for Porter, said his client was a woman of previous good character who had been working hard in two businesses and had intended to repay the money.

By Anwen Evans