A former Oxfordshire care home assistant who stole more than £7,600 from vulnerable elderly residents has been jailed for three months.

Margaret Gegg, 49, of St Hilda's Close, Didcot, had admitted three charges of theft and four of false accounting.

Gegg, a married mother-of-two, wept in the dock when she appeared at Oxford Crown Court as Paul Harrison, prosecuting, said she stole cheque-books from three infirm residents at the Westgate House care home, in Wallingford, and a pension book from another.

He said the victims were Mrs Stevens, a 98-year-old, who has since died, and a 91-year-old and 93-year-old. The two victims who are still alive have not been told of Gegg's crimes, because it would distress them, the court heard.

Mr Harrison said Mrs Stevens' son found discrepancies in his mother's bank account when he was looking after her affairs after she died in October last year2005, and that led to the discovery that the cheque-books were missing.

He said: "As a result, police inquiries began and police arrested Mrs Gegg in January and searched her house. A cheque for £1,000 payable to Gegg was found in one cheque-book."

Mr Harrison said Gegg, who had mild depression, had stolen £7,682.55 by writing the cheques.

Claire Frazer, defending, said Gegg had worked in care homes and for the NHS for 27 years. She said: "She has never been in trouble with the police. Her husband said she has never had a parking ticket.

"She found herself with escalating debts and was working three days a week in a care home to pay them off.

"When this incident happened, she was £20,000 in debt but now she is in nearer £39,000 of debt, with nine credit cards and debt facilities. She didn't have a lavish lifestyle, but the debts were mounting up."

Miss Frazer said Gegg found it difficult to ask her husband, who works full-time, to pay off the debts. She added that Gegg's father, a retired clergyman, had offered to repay the stolen money.

Judge David Morton Jack told Gegg: "You stole the cheque-books of these three old ladies and the pension book of a fourth.

"You were not only in a position of trust as an employee of the nursing home, but in a particular position of trust in relation to these infirm, very old ladies. This is a case where only a custodial sentence can be justified."

He said the £39,000 of debt must have been expenditure made for selfish reasons.