A FRAUDSTER who stole more than £17,000 from her dead friend’s business has dodged jail.

Danielle Pisani, 34, was handed a two-year jail sentence suspended for two years after admitting six counts of fraud while she was business manager at Moor’s Health and Beauty head office.

The offences took place between December 2013 and October last year following the death of owner Sharon Moors, who was also Pisani’s close friend.

The court heard how Pisani had racked up £11,000 of debt to HMRC.

After the sentencing at Chelmsford Crown Court, Freda Moor, Sharon’s mother, described Pisani as a “horrible, horrible person”, but said she expected her not to be jailed.

She said: “I guessed this is what she would get – I didn’t want her to go to prison.

“I just want the money back. I want my grandson Harvey to be paid back.”

Pisani, of Springfield Meadows, Little Clacton, had worked at the company, which has salons in Clacton and Colchester, for more than ten years alongside founder Sharon Moor.

The pair became close friends and Pisani had helped run the business when Miss Moor was suffering from a viral infection while she waited for a kidney transplant.

Miss Moor died in March 2013 and her family – includingmother Freda – carried on the salons in her memory and for her son, Harvey.

After Sharon’s death, Pisani continued working for the company and supported the family emotionally while they were grieving.

But in October 2014, Mrs Moor, of Heath Road, Tendring, became suspicious after checking some holiday wages paperwork and found Pisani had overpaid herself.

Further checks of business accounts, payments and bank statements revealed a web of deceit where she had taken cash and goods worth £17,738.

The family had even treated Pisani to day trips to London and Spanish holidays to thank her for her support after Sharon’s death.

Pisani has admitted taking false wage packets, false holiday pay, transferring and withdrawing money from the company’s accounts, using the company card to buy goods and having products and treatments at the salons without paying. Judge Patricia Lynch QC said: “Taking this money from your friend’s child really is the most base of human actions – it is appalling. It is awful.

“I see no point in sending you to prison, but you deserve it.

“The priority here is getting the money back so let’s do that.”

Philippa Beswick, mitigating for Pisani, said: “She is deeply, deeply regretful.

“This is a young lady we would hope we would never see again in the courts.”

Pisani has already managed to pay £1,000 back to the family.

A confiscation process to reclaim £16,802 was started and Pisani was ordered to pay a statutory victim surcharge.