A 34-year-old woman who looked after an elderly couple stole more than £75,000 from their bank account. She used the money to gamble, buy drugs and buy food.
Rebecca Fidler, 34, was employed to help the couple in Carlisle, Cumbria, because of their advanced age. The couple trusted her with their bank card to withdraw their pension, but she spent all of their life savings.
Bill Gass, a Royal Navy veteran who served in Prince Philip’s fleet in World War II, and his wife Annie said they had no idea what Fidler was doing. Gass sadly died last December before Fidler could face justice.
Annie told the Daily Mail: “She thought she was going to get away with it. We believed her. The police came and told us a lot of your money had gone out of the bank. She was taking good care of us and we didn’t realise she was cheating us from the start.
She looked after the elderly couple by helping them with cleaning, shopping and cooking, as well as collecting their pension.
A fraud investigator reported to Cumbria Police that large sums of money had been transferred from the elderly person’s account to another account belonging to Fidler.
The couple were shocked to discover they only had around £2,000 left.
The bank where the couple had opened the account has reimbursed Ms Gass £40,000.
