A CAREWORKER who stole a valuable watch from an elderly woman with dementia in a North Yorkshire care home is today on the run in Italy.

Margaret Johnson died a few weeks after Maira Liu, 53, took the £2,900 watch she had bought in Barbados, York Crown Court heard.

Her son-in-law David Beckwith said she loved her jewellery so much she wouldn’t allow anyone, including family members, to wear it.

Giving evidence, the ex-policeman told the jury how he tracked down the jewellery shop where Liu had pawned the watch for £500.

The jury heard that when she was confronted with what he had found, Liu claimed that Mrs Johnson had given the watch to her as a gift. Earlier she had claimed she knew nothing about it.

Psychologist Dr Nicholas Todd told the jury Mrs Johnson’s dementia was so severe she would have been mentally incapable of deciding to give anyone a gift.

The jury heard Liu had tried unsuccessfully to get a £500 advance on her salary at the beginning of December without success.

After Liu was charged with fraud by abuse of position, she fled the country before she could be tried.

But the trial went ahead in her absence, and she was convicted after the jury had been in retirement for less than 30 minutes.

Today she is wanted on two warrants and has been given a final chance to return to the UK to face justice. She will be sentenced in November whether or not she attends court. The home sacked her.

The Recorder of York, Judge Sean Morris, said Liu had spent more than a year fobbing off attempts to make her return from Italy, claiming she was too ill to travel and was suffering from depression without producing any medical evidence to support her claim.

At one point, she emailed the court telling it “you are spending taxpayers’ money unnecessarily” and claimed there was “not a shred of clear evidence” against her.

“I disagree with that as has the jury,” the judge said.

Liu, who had told a magistrates court her address was via San Franceso, Mignano, Provincia di Caserta, Italy, did not enter a plea to the charge of fraud by abuse of position. 

A Harrogate solicitors’ firm who had acted for her withdrew before her trial because she didn’t give them any instructions and there was no defence barrister representing her in court.

Christopher Bevan, prosecuting, said Mrs Johnson was in Granby Nursing Home, Harrogate, in December 2019 for respite care.  The home had a strict policy that staff could not accept gifts from residents or those in the home.

On December 23, her daughter and Mr Beckwith came to take her to his home for Christmas.

Giving evidence, Mr Beckwith said the watch she always wore on her arm was missing.  

After home management inquiries failed to find it, he then contacted every jeweller’s shop in Harrogate telling them what the watch looked like and I’Ansons in Cheltenham Parade told him a woman called Maire Liu had pawned it with them for £500 on December 19.

He alerted the home and the police.