A MOTHER has been banned from every shop in York for 12 months after she staged two shoplifting expeditions to the city.

Amanda Kilkenny must also pay nearly £1,000 in compensation and court charges, despite having had her benefits cut by officials.

Katherine Schofield, prosecuting, said the 42-year-old shoplifter targeted Marks & Spencer’s store in Parliament Street, walking out on three occasions with hundreds of pounds of food and clothes.

MORE COURT: Man jailed over violent robbery on terrified pensioner in her own home

“If you want to come stealing in York, you will have to pay for it,” district judge Adrian Lower told her at York Magistrates’ Court.

“You can have no complaints. You can expect to go to prison if you are before me again.”

Mother-of-two Kilkenny, of Elmfield Drive, Bradford, pleaded guilty to two offences of theft.

Her solicitor Mohammed Abid said she had been wanting to get presents in the run-up to Christmas, but had difficulty shopping in Bradford because she had been banned from “a number of its shops”.

Unemployed Kilkenny was given a 12-month community order excluding her from all shops within the York Outer Ring Road and ordered to pay £762.50 compensation to Marks & Spencer, £85 prosecution costs and an £85 statutory surcharge.

The court heard she has 30 previous convictions including 17 for theft and has committed offences in Teesside and West Yorkshire as well as York.

Ms Schofield said Kilkenny first shoplifted in Marks & Spencer at 3.20pm on December 2 with another woman, stealing children’s clothes and food. An hour later, the pair were back in the store stealing more items.

They returned at 5.10pm on December 8 when they took another haul. Altogether they stole £945 worth of stock from the store.

Mr Abid said Kilkenny was a single parent bringing up two children. She had last been caught shoplifting in September 2016.

She was on universal credit but that had been sanctioned. She was hoping for her benefits to be restored shortly.