A PSYCHIATRIC nursing assistant who claimed almost £60,000 in taxi fares because of a fear of public transport has been spared jail.

Father-of-two John Jones suffers from panic attacks and was given permission to take cabs to and from work.

But he falsely claimed thousands of pounds from a work fund designed to get disabled people into employment by hugely exaggerating the amount of taxis he was taking.

Liverpool Crown Court heard the 46-year-old forged his employer’s signature on claim forms and provided false taxi receipts in order to con £33,250 from the Access to Work scheme.

But yesterday Jones, who is now working as a care assistant in Lydiate, was spared jail after the court heard he suffered from claustrophobia and agoraphobia and was in a state of “chronic anxiety”.

Judge David Swift suspended a 10 month prison sentence for two years.

He also placed Jones – who admitted 32 offences of false accounting and had 24 similar offences taken into account – on a two-year supervision order.

He said: “This was thoroughly dishonest, it was deliberate and involved the production of false documents and it was not something you accidentally drifted into.”

But after sparing Jones, of Wortley Road, Fazakerley, from an immediate prison sentence, Judge Swift warned him: “This is a chance for you, if you fail to grasp it a custodial sentence will be imposed.”

The judge heard Jones had been working as a psychiatric nursing assistant for Merseycare NHS Trust based at Rathbone Hospital in Wavertree, before moving to Ashworth high security hospital in Maghull.

But despite claiming he was working seven days a week, Jones sometimes only took taxis on three days.