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A bank worker gave a cheeky five-word response to the police after she was caught stealing £44,000 in cash over the space of two years.

Natalee Gilmour, 33, who formerly worked at thein Carluke, , for ten years, stole money between January 2016 and April 2018. She betrayed the trust of her superiors after she was given additional above her customer service role.

She carried out duties such as counting unsupervised and pinched money which was rejected from a counting machine. The sneaky worker deposited the funds into her own account. However, she eventually raised suspicions with her bosses after they realised that huge sums had disappeared. When arrested, she replied: "I know how this looks."

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The former customer assistant appeared at Lanark Sheriff and confessed to embezzlement. Depute fiscal Flora McCamley explained how Gilmour peformed the additional dutes on an "unofficial" basis. She said: "She was employed as a customer service assistant but the bank manager saw potential in her and allowed her to carry out duties with more responsibility and to carry out these duties unsupervised.

"Between October 2017 and March 2018, she performed on an unofficial basis, assistant managerial duties at the . Part of these duties was to conduct physical checks of the cash the branch was holding and she also had to check and top up teller dispensers at the branch. This should be carried out by two members of staff but it appears she carried these out unsupervised on a number of occasions."

The added: "In spring 2018 the manager began to notice that large sums of were missing and unaccounted for so they notified their superiors and an internal investigation was commenced. Police gained access to her bank accounts and it showed deposits which could not be explained. She was subsequently interviewed but had no explanation for these large sums of cash being deposited into her account."

Tom Watters, defending, said: "It won't surprise the court that this is a very complicated matter and there were thousands of bank statements to be looked at." Sheriff Siobhan Connelly deferred sentence on Gilmour until next month for reports and continued bail. She added: "You have now pled guilty to what is a very serious charge."

Gilmour had originally been accused of £74,890 but pled guilty to the lesser amount. A spokesperson for the Bank of said: "We have a zero-tolerance approach to misconduct and always fully support the authorities during an investigation."