A thief has finally been jailed after being caught stealing from bosses for a THIRD time.

Donna Davies, 42, from Macclesfield, stole nearly £5,000 while working at a pub between April and June, last year.

Despite a previous conviction for stealing from an employer, she avoided jail at a hearing in January.

But within six weeks she stole more than £1,600 from the Max Spielmann branch in Congleton.

Davies, of Maple Avenue, Macclesfield, admitted theft at Stockport magistrates’ court and breaching a suspended sentence. At Chester Crown Court last week, she was jailed for 14 months.

Court documents revealed that between February 10 and 27 she stole a total of £1,619.33 cash. After the hearing, Cheshire Police said that Davies told detectives she spent the stolen cash on slot machines in bookmakers.

A spokesman said: “Police received a complaint about the theft of a sum of money from a member of staff at Max Spielmann in Congleton.

“A 42-year-old woman was interviewed and admitted taking the sum over three different occasions and spending it in slot machines at bookmakers.”

The Timpson Group, which owns Max Spielmann, declined to comment.

Davies made headlines in January after admitting to stealing £4,724 from bosses at the De Trafford Arms in Alderley Edge – but then not showing up to court because she ‘couldn’t get time off work’ from her job at a printing firm.

Then judge Roger Dutton sentenced her to 10 months in prison suspended for two years, warning her she had ‘escaped prison by a hair’s breadth’.

The hearing in January was told that while working on reception, Davies brazenly refunded money from the credit card machine into her bank account on four occasions at the Alderley Edge hotel between April 2 and June 21. It heard that Davies stole because as a team leader paid £8.20 an hour she felt overworked and underpaid. The hearing was told that she had a previous conviction for stealing from an employer.

Stuart Kaufman, defending her at the time, Davies claimed hormone replacement therapy after a hysterectomy had ‘thrown her off course’ and drawn back into her addictive behaviour.