Desperate fruit machine addict, 24, stole £30,000 of his mother's jewellery to pay off gambling debts before discovering she was dying of cancer

Gambling addict: Lee Ellis, 24, pinched his mother's beloved rings and necklaces to repay money he borrowed to fuel his out-of-control addiction

A fruit machine addict stole £30,000 of his mother's jewellery to pay off his gambling debts before owning up when he found out she was dying of cancer.
Lee Ellis, 24, pinched his mother's beloved rings and necklaces to repay money he borrowed to fuel his out-of-control addiction.
Ridden with guilt, Ellis handed himself in to police after confessing the theft to his devastated mother.
The turning point came when he was stunned to discover she had been struck down by terminal cancer.
Ellis, of Felixstowe, Suffolk, has now opened his heart about his gambling hell after he was spared prison by Ipswich magistrates.
And he issued a warning as he battles to rebuild his shattered relationship with his family to others sucked in by the lure of winning huge windfalls on fruit machines.
'I feel embarrassed and very remorseful. I love my family with all my heart,' he said. 'This is what addiction does to you.'
Ellis admitted one count of theft and three fraud offences. He plundered jewellery worth about £30,000 from his mother, who's also a grandmother and wasn't named, between August 1 and September 28 last year.
The fraud charges related to the gambler pawning the gems to Christopher Boreham Jewellers in Felixstowe.
Lesla Small, prosecuting, told the court Ellis gave himself up at his local police station in January. Ms Small said he admitted taking his mother's jewellery from a wardrobe in her bedroom.
He pocketed just £2,000 to pay off his gambling debts and then hoped to buy his mother's pride and joy back six months later.

But depressed and frightened, Ellis could not do that as he became unemployed.
The court heard his mother, who wept with shame as Ellis told her what he had done, had hoped to leave her treasured jewellery to her grand-daughter.
Ian Duckworth, defending, said she had responded well to treatment and Ellis had become her carer as his father works six days a week.
Mr Duckworth told JPs: 'It's a sad case all round. His parents are clearly supportive. Mum's very distressed. They are building bridges - not easy in the light of all that's gone on.'

Ellis, of Felixstowe, Suffolk, appeared at Ipswich Magistrates' Court where he admitted the charges

Ellis was given a 10-month jail sentence suspended for 12 months. He was banned from all bookmakers in Suffolk and ordered to go on a thinking skills programme and pay £85 costs.
Today, Ellis confessed it took just three weeks to become addicted to slot machines offering the lure of big payouts.
Jobless Ellis said: 'I feel embarrassed and very remorseful. I love my family with all my heart. This is what addiction does to you.
'You don't think about anyone else but yourself when you are addicted. All you worry about is money. I love my mum with all my heart. She is my best friend. I love her so much.'
He added: 'We are getting on quite well now. I am her carer and we are slowly building up our relationship. She has forgiven me. My family are forgiving me very slowly.'
Ellis said he wept when he admitted his betrayal to his mother.

'I feel completely awful for everything. I have got an addiction and stay clear of fruit machines now. It's a mug's game, an absolute mug's game'

Lee Ellis, 24

'I broke down in tears. I felt disgraced. I felt the worst I have ever felt in my life telling the person I loved the most what I had done,' he said.
'I told her I had an addiction and I needed help. It was the hardest thing I have every done in my life.'
Ellis began going into bookmakers a few years ago with friends but said his problems began to spiral when he became hooked on fruit machines a year ago.
'I started getting more serious when a friend picked up a pretty heavy addiction. I watched him and got into gambling.
'I started to gamble quite a lot, using any money I could get when I was working. It was the lights on the machine that were attractive.
'You think it is easy and then you find out it's not. Then you go chasing your money,' said Ellis. 'It's the worst thing you can do. That's what they (the bookmakers) want you to do.
'The compulsion happened at an alarming rate ' after about three weeks.'
As his debts mounted so did the psychological effects of being hooked. He borrowed money from friends which he could not pay back.
Ellis said the pressure eventually led to him stealing from his own mother so he could pay back his mates.
But he insisted that when he did so he did not know she was ill and had every intention of returning the jewellery before she noticed it had gone.
'I was chasing something that was never there. It was panic, fear, humiliation and depression. When you gamble you get depressed pretty easily. It's a very lonely place,' said Ellis.
'I feel completely awful for everything. I have got an addiction and stay clear of fruit machines now. It's a mug's game, an absolute mug's game.
'The bookmakers want you to leave with nothing but your shorts. The idea is they take everything you have got.'

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