A CAR salesman with a gambling addiction pocketed thousands of pounds from a business - even after he was spared a prison sentence for committing the same offence at a different company.

Serial fraudster Riccardo Iampietro was sentenced to two years in prison suspended for two years in April 2017 after admitting fraud and theft.

He committed the offences as he worked for a Southampton dealership.

In January 2017, he had taken on a new job at Route One Cars in Bournemouth.

Around a month after he began work, the owners noticed the payment for a vehicle had not been banked.

They confronted Iampietro, who "broke down and cried" before admitting he had taken the money.

He then offered to work for free until the debt was repaid, which the owners accepted.

In June - just two months after being sentenced - Iampietro's bosses noticed a car was not at the site.

He initially told them it was having an MOT, but after checks were made he admitted he had already sold it for £2,950 and pocketed the money.

Stuart Ellacott, prosecuting at Bournemouth Crown Court on Friday, said Iampietro had committed a "breach of trust".

The defendant, 29, admitted stealing £6,400 in total, as well as commission of a further offence during the operational period of a suspended sentence order.

In April last year, a court heard the defendant bought a car from a dealership in June 2016.

Within three days, he had put different number plates on it and sold it for £6,500.

During the time he was on bail for the offence, he took a job at Doves Vauxhall Southampton, where he pocketed a deposit for a car worth more than £5,000.

In November last year, Iampietro admitted stealing £2,300 in rent, fees and deposit money from unsuspecting house hunters while working as a letting agent at Southampton firm, Homelife Lettings.

Timothy Bradbury, who represented Iampietro for his most recent offences, said: "This is a still relatively young man who for many years has had an appalling addiction to gambling, and was gambling very substantial sums of money in a crazy and reckless way."

The offence "lacked sophistication", the barrister said.

"It is typical of the reckless gambler who naively persuades himself on the next occasion, if he can just have a bit of money, he can gamble it and make it back and no one will be any the wiser," he said.

Iampietro, previously of Woodford Close, Ringwood, has since moved out of the area to Brookwood Road in Hounslow.

His partner is pregnant with the couple's first child.

"She is going to need his support during her confinement," Mr Bradbury said.

"I urge you not to impose a sentence that kills dead any hope he has for rehabilitating himself."

However, Judge Douglas Field said Iampietro must serve an immediate prison sentence of 34 months because of his "appalling record".

"Your employers had a great deal of trust in you," the judge said.