Peter Casey, 37, was also ordered to pay back some of the money he had taken when he appeared at Warwick Crown Court on Friday.

Casey had at first denied stealing up to £16,992 from five residents of the Way Ahead Support Services home in Oakwood Grove, Warwick between March 2001 and the end of January 2005.

His trial could have taken up to three weeks but on the day it was due to begin in February he changed his pleas to guilty.

Casey, of Coundon, Coventry, admitted taking five amounts between £268 and £16,992 from residents, but despite the amount he had stolen an investigation revealed Casey now had only £15,000 to his name.

Jailing Casey for 14 months, Judge Robin Onions ordered that his amount should be confiscated under the Proceeds of Crime Act.

He said the money should be used to pay compensation to Casey's victims, with between £93 and £5,650 going to the victims.

Casey will face a further year in jail if this is not paid within six months.

Way Ahead Support Services is a Warwick-based charity that cares for around 60 people in the area. Its chairman of trustees Sheila Cunningham said: "We are very disappointed that the manager of one of our services should have abused his position of trust.

"We are pleased that justice has been done."

During a previous hearing when Casey had entered his guilty pleas, Judge Richard Griffith-Jones, who had been due to hear the trial, praised the Casey's barrister John Attwood and Mr Ward for the work they had done in resolving the case.

He told them: "What an excellent example it is of conscientious and competent members of the bar working together on a complex case.

"A huge amount of public money and potential distress for witnesses has been saved."