A Teesside solicitor pleaded guilty in court today to stealing £9,500 from the Middlesbrough firm where she worked.

Elizabeth Rebecca Handley, 30, appeared at Teesside Crown Court where she pleaded guilty to four charges of theft from Freers Solicitors in Baker Street, Middlesbrough, and four of false accounting between May 2001 and January 2002.

Her barrister Robin Denny told the judge that she was known to most judges and barristers in the area because she had appeared in the Teesside Combined Courts centre on an almost daily basis.

The Recorder of Middlesbrough Judge Peter Fox QC agreed to transfer her case to Durham Crown Court for sentence. The judge told her :"You should know as a practicing solicitor that by giving you bail it is no indication of any sort as to the sentence which you may receive."

Mrs Handley of Turnpike Road, Sedgefield, was remanded on bail for pre-sentence reports.