A pub manager faked a robbery to cover up the fact she had stolen the takings to pay for her drug addiction, a court heard.

Jayne Gill, 49, scraped her forehead with a cheese grater to make it look like she was injured and claimed she was mugged in an alleyway while carrying the takings of £1,648 from the Duke's Head Hotel in Great Yarmouth to the bank, Norwich Crown Court was told.

John Morgans, prosecuting, said the matter was reported to police, who investigated and checked CCTV images which did not seem to back up her story.

He said CCTV showed she was the only person going into the alleyway and the injury to her forehead, which she claimed had been inflicted during the robbery, was already visible before she went down the alleyway.

He said when re-interviewed, she admitted she had made up the robbery and inflicted the injury herself using a cheese grater. She also admitted stealing £1,165 from the takings of the The Feathers Pub in Gorleston, which she also managed.

He said Gill said she had taken the cash to pay a drugs debt.

Gill, of Magdalen Square, Gorleston, admitted attempting to pervert the course of justice and the two thefts from pubs. She was jailed for nine months.

Jailing her, Recorder Frank Burton said this type of offence struck at the heart of the justice system - although he accepted she had not implicated anyone else in the robbery.

Jonathan Goodman, for Gill, said her addiction to drugs had brought about her offending, not any desire to steal to pay for luxury goods and go on holiday.

'This is a lady who has suffered from a number of medical conditions,' he said.

He said she became addicted to prescribed painkillers and this led to her using illegal drugs, particularly cocaine, to relieve the pain.

Mr Goodman said she sought help to try to deal with her addiction.

However, he said there was no magic wand and she had succumbed to pressure to repay the debts.

He said the fake robbery was ill-thought through and 'quickly unravelled'.

The fake allegation made by Jayne Gill that she had been robbed in broad daylight led to claims that Great Yarmouth was being hit by a crime wave.

The false claim was one of three high profile crime reports made in the town in a short space of time.

One of the other reports concerned an allegation that a woman had been sexually assaulted in the grounds of the Minster on February 3 - that allegation was subsequently withdrawn.

The other high profile crime related to a man in his 60s who was robbed of £200 and assaulted at a cash point in King Street on January 30.

The claim that Yarmouth was being hit by a crime wave was made at the time by Jonathan Childs, who was county councillor then.

That claim was rejected by both the head of Yarmouth police Supt Roger Wilshire and borough council leader Graham Plant.

Supt Wiltshire published crime graphs which he said showed there was no spike.