A fraudster who works for GMP has avoided jail after she started to pay back her ill-gotten gains.
Barbara O'Shea, 58, conned her next-door neighbour into lending her thousands of pounds.
Instead of using the £18,000 she borrowed to buy a share in a house, as she told him, she settled debts and made payments to gambling companies.
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He was left 'distraught' and suffered 'incredible damage' as a result of the deception, Minshull Street Crown Court heard.
O'Shea, from Stretford, who works as an admin officer for the force, has now paid back £3,000.
At a previous hearing, she was warned she could be sent to prison if she didn't keep up with £500 a month repayments.
But after being told of the financial reparation, a judge ordered O'Shea to do unpaid work instead.
"You carried out a fraud against a man who trusted you, and as a result of that fraud he was left substantially without funds," Judge Tina Landale said.
"He was also left distraught because he believed that he could trust you, and he had only tried to help you.
"He wants his money back, you have been paying back that sum, and I expect you will continue to do so."
In August 2018, O'Shea told her neighbour that she was trying to purchase a 20 per cent stake in a house.
He agreed to lend her the money, which she said she would re-pay him using a lump sum from her pension.
He firstly sent O'Shea a cheque for £13,250, which she spent within two days.
Then she told him she needed more money to buy another five per cent in the property.
In total he gave her £18,300.
He repeatedly asked her when she was going to pay him back, because he was trying to purchase his father's home after his death.
In September 2019, O'Shea told him she'd been suspended from work.
He then 'realised he wouldn't get his money back', prosecutors said.
The fraud was uncovered after officers searched her home as part of an investigation two fraudulent loan applications.
The applications were made in the name of another neighbour.
O'Shea, of Stanway Street, Stretford, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to six counts of fraud by false representation and one charge of obtaining or disclosing personal details.
She was sentenced to a two year community order, to include 180 hours of unpaid work and 25 rehabilitation activity requirement days.
