A CITY centre pub manager who fled across the Atlantic with £20,000 takings at the height of York's Ebor Week was caught out when he emailed a friend to brag of his good fortune.

Former Brubakers manager Jeffrey Parvin had snatched the cash and returned to his native Canada as a way of getting back at his bosses, a court heard.

But the boastful email he sent to a former colleague led to his being tracked down and extradited back to Britain to face justice.

Parvin, 35, brought his suitcase with him when he appeared at York Crown Court yesterday to admit the theft.

Parvin ran off in 1999 and was arrested and extradited from Canada last year after his former colleague tipped off police about his email. Recorder Peter Kelson QC sentenced Parvin to 16 months imprisonment and said the theft was motivated by his desire to get revenge on two senior managers after a row over disciplinary action.

He said: "You are now back in this country with not many friends. You are going to feel more abandoned than most in prison, and then you have to get yourself back home afterwards."

The court heard how a substantial sum of cash was discovered to be missing from two safes at Brubakers on the morning of August 20, 1999.

Alan Mitcheson, prosecuting, said the method of theft, which involved disarming alarms, knowledge of the safe's location and the use of keys, suggested an inside job.

Suspicion immediately fell on Parvin when he was found to be missing from his flat above the Blossom Street pub, which has since closed and reopened as a hotel.

It was later discovered that Parvin had sold items from his flat earlier in the week and had visited an ex-girlfriend to say that he would return to Canada as his father was ill, said Mr Mitcheson.

For Parvin, barrister Glenn Parsons said: "He should have taken out his frustration against his employers in an entirely different way."

"He knew he must come back to this country and face up to what he has done and take his punishment."

Updated: 09:53 Saturday, March 01, 2003