A terminally ill former treasurer of a working men’s club has been convicted in his absence for stealing more than £58,000 from his employer.

Roy Weston will now be sentenced despite not attending his trial since Tuesday, August 2, claiming he was too ill to travel to court.

He had not finished giving evidence but the judge took the unusual decision on Tuesday to continue without him.

The 73-year-old pensioner, who is receiving only palliative care for prostate cancer, denied siphoning off the cash from Rusthall Working Men’s Club over nearly four years while in charge of the accounts.

Married Weston, of Fremlin Close, Rusthall, took funds from lottery machines at the club, fiddled the banking of cheques and raided the members’ Christmas fund.

Judge Heather Baucher told the jury of seven women and five men when Weston first went sick: “The position is the defendant is not at all well. He is in pain and taking painkillers, which has knocked him significantly. He can’t get out of his house.”

Efforts to arrange for him to continue his evidence by video link failed.

“I want you to know that public money is not being wasted,” said Judge Baucher. “If it feels like you are being messed around, you are not.”

She joked: “I haven’t been sitting here doing my knitting. If I had it would be a very long scarf indeed. It would be a Liverpool (FC) scarf.”

She added on Monday: “If I were you I would be pretty fed up by now. You have got to trust I know what I am doing.

“This court is not standing empty. I am doing my best to make sure public money is not wasted.”

Weston’s case will be mentioned in front of the judge again on Friday.

The judge spoke of the delays in the trial reaching court. Weston first appeared in December 2013 and the trial was listed for May 2014.

“This trial was the fifth time it had been listed,” she said. “During that time some witnesses have died and another was very ill.”

One prosecution witness was seriously ill during the trial and chose not to have surgery so that she could give evidence.

Judge Baucher said of Weston not attending for his trial: “His GP declared him fit. To be quite frank he knew the day was up.”

The judge told of her heartache at becoming a widow at the age of 50 when her husband died within nine weeks of being diagnosed with cancer.