A Wandsworth Council finance officer has been jailed for two years after plundering more than £100,000 of public funds from the local authority's housing account.

Colin Hadfield, from Caterham, stole £102,380 between May 2009 until July 2011 by abusing his position in the council's housing team.

He told the court he committed the crime because his mortgage arrears and wife's redundancy had put the family in a precarious financial position.

The 35-year-old was initially employed by the council in a temporary role in May 2007 until he secured a full time position as a finance officer in January 2008.

But within 16 months, the father-of-two had begun to transfer funds from private landlords on behalf of tenants using the council's Saffron computer system to which he had full access.

Hadfield, who pleaded guilty to fraud by abuse of postion, deliberately used the details of landlords known to the council, in order to avoid detection, but swapped their bank details for his on the transfer forms.

The transfers were able to slip through undetected because he "copied and pasted" the signatures of genuine housing officers, which he had lifted from other documents, on to the forms.

In total he made 47 fraudulent transfers over the two-year period, 41 of which were transferred into his NatWest bank account and the remaining six were moved to his sister, Luann Hatton's HSBC account.

Hatton, who pleaded guilty to transferring criminal property, was said to have received more than £14,000 of the money her brother stole.

The 34-year-old mother of two, who worked at Lloyd's bank, was told she must complete 240 hours of community service within a 12-month period.

Hadfield resigned from his position immediately after his arrest.

Recorder Alexia Durran, sitting at Kingston Crown Court, said the offences were aggravated because both defendants had spent the money, which was never recovered, on "luxury goods".

She said: "In my opinion your (Hadfield's) offence is so serious that neither a fine nor a community sentence is appropriate.

"I am compelled to impose a custodial sentence on you.

"The fraud involved a substantial amount of public funds, took place over a long time period and involved a high degree of sophistication.

"The lowest sentence I can pass is 24 months, had you not pleaded guilty the sentence I would have imposed is 42 months."