A man stole more than £160,000 of pure silver from his employer to help pay off his mortgage.

John Gormley, 34, and his wife Sarah, 31, a former nursery nurse, both of Conway Road, Newport, were sentenced yesterday at Newport Crown court after admitting their parts in the theft and sale of the precious metal.

Prosecutor, Martyn Kelly, told the court that John Gormley stole the silver bullion from his employers International Rectifier LTD, who are based in Cardiff Road, Newport.

Mr Kelly said: "In three years he had sold 324 kilos of silver and received £160,301.74 in return."

Mr Kelly told the court the company specialises in making semi conductors for use in the electronics industry using silver 'targets' worth between £6,000-£7,000 weighing seven kilos.

Mr Kelly said: "On October 23 last year the company became aware that one of the machines was showing an abnormal use of targets.

"They installed CCTV in the area where the targets were kept. They also put a decoy aluminium target in place."

Mr Kelly told the court that the decoy target went missing, but the CCTV did not capture its removal, so the company reinstalled the CCTV.

" Mr Gormley was captured acting suspiciously around the cases area where the targets were stored."

Mr Kelly said at this point the company called in the police, and a subsequent search of the Gormley home found correspondence from a bullion dealer based in the West Midlands called Group International.

The court heard packages of money, worth £156,000, were delivered to their home by Royal Mail Special delivery, where both Gormley and his wife signed for them.

Police discovered between October 5 and 26 the Gormleys paid off £32,955 in cash from their mortgage at three different Nationwide banks across Gwent.

In January 14 this year both Gormley and his wife were arrested and questioned by police, and subsequently each pleaded guilty to conceal, disguise, convert, transfer or remove criminal property, and John Gormley pleaded guilty to a second charge of theft.

John Gormley was sentenced to 20 months in prison, and must serve half.

Sarah Gormley was sentenced to an eight-month custodial sentence, suspended for 12 months.

PANEL John Gormley's defence, James Tucker, told the court Gormley first received payment from the bullion group when he sent them £60 worth of silver shards that had been spluttered onto the floor, and which would otherwise have been put in the bin.

He said Gormley swept these small pieces up and "though he was doing wrong, it was not an offence that had a direct impact on his employers."

Mr Tucker told the court this led to him eventually taking whole ingots.

"He accepts responsibility and he would seek to take any punishment to deflect punishment from his wife."

Sarah Gormley's defence, Andrew Morse, told the court: "Her involvement is more limited."

He said his client had signed for the deliveries of cash, but he said: "It took her by some surprise when the full extent of the theft was made known to her."