A DISGRACED senior account manager has been convicted of stealing thousands of pounds worth of smartphones.

Kelli Kilpatrick was sentenced at Reading Crown Court on Thursday (May 24) after she denied using her position at Vodafone to obtain the devices and sell them online for profit.

The 30-year-old, who was responsible for managing several important accounts for Vodafone, including Apple and Bose, was based at the company's headquarters in Newbury.

The court previously heard how she had control of the accounts and placed orders, costing Vodafone more than £200,000 in lost earnings.

She was sentenced to three years in prison.

In one example, she claimed to be ordering the goods for Accor Hotels, but would sell the iPhones, tablets and SIM cards on eBay.

An internal investigation was launched after certain clients 'rejected orders' asking for the goods to be delivered personally by Kilpatrick instead of a courier.

William Eaglestone, prosecuting, said: "The number of phones that Vodafone say were taken without their consent in the name of the Apple account was 528.

"If the clients wanted the handsets, they could have those delivered to them personally and that is when Vodafone became suspicious.

"From all of the analysis, the total cost to Vodafone is thought to be £239,000. This was the amount Vodafone had to pay manufacturers such as Apple and Samsung for the devices.

"That was therefore the loss suffered by Vodafone from these orders."

Kilpatrick, from Salford, Manchester, was said to leave a contact number with the buyer in case anything went wrong with the order.

She is also said to have forged a signature to increase budgets at the phone company's headquarters, while having a large control over accounts and influencing budgets.

The Vodafone investigation was prompted by a call from Apple to say that 31 devices had been added without their authorisation.

A security incident report was raised by Vodafone's shipping team in Stoke and this came to the corporate security team in Newbury.

The hotel chain had not placed any orders with the phone company although records indicated 434 were sent to Accor and 108 went to Vodafone.