A STORE manager did a flit with £41,150 takings from the safe before living the high life on the continent for six months.

Brian Hewitt only worked for three months at Sainsbury’s Local, in Framwellgate Moor, Durham, before carrying out the theft.

Durham Crown Court was told he contacted the store on February 26 to say he was taking a day’s leave, which was agreed, but later called in and signed for a set of safe keys.

David Wilkinson, prosecuting, said a colleague’s suspicions were aroused on March 1 because the keys were missing and there were two missed cash collections. She was unable to contact Hewitt.

And when in-store CCTV footage was checked, it showed him going into the office on February 28, opening the safe and removing cash bags.

Mr Wilkinson said that after leaving work that day, Hewitt drove to Kent, took a Eurostar trans-Channel link and spent the next six months in France and Spain.

On his return to the country, last month, he was stop checked in his car by police in Doncaster on September 30.

He told police: “I know what I have done. I was in a bad place and have been since I was in Saudi,” referring to a previous job as a store manager in the Middle East.

Mr Wilkinson said that all Hewitt had left of the stolen money was £559.37, which was seized. In interview he said he took the money “on the spur of the moment”.

Hewitt, 42, of no fixed address, admitted theft.

Stuart Graham, mitigating, said Hewitt previously worked for 18 years as a store manager with access to money.

He said: “What made him do this, he still can’t understand.

“It’s one of those moments that just flashed before him.

He ran and panicked, and just lived in a fantasy world.”

He added: “He was on his knees, living rough after Saudi Arabia, but after two years in the doldrums was able to find work at the store.

“There seems to have been a catalogue of problems, a can of worms, engaging in counselling at some point.

“He had a troubled childhood and has gone through life running from situations, never facing up to reality, and then going on this crazy escapade, maybe thinking it was his last chance.”

Jailing him for a year, Recorder Eric Elliott told Hewitt: “You are an intelligent man. You know for this gross breach of trust, living the high life for six months, there can only be one outcome.”

He made a compensation order to award the retrieved £559.37 to Sainsbury’s.