An Australian teacher who stole two backpacks and laptops in Bali will spend at least another month behind bars.

Mother-of-two Vanessa Louise Crimmins, 45, was found guilty of stealing backpacks containing a HP laptop and a MacBook Air from outside Popular Deli, a supermarket in North Kuta last October.

On Thursday, a panel of judges in Denpasar District Court sentenced Crimmins to five months in jail for her crimes. 

‘The defendant Vanessa Louise Crimmins has been found guilty of violating article 362 of the criminal code on theft,’ presiding judge Gusti Ayu Akhiryani said.

‘The panel of judges found no exonerating reasons, so the defendant must be sentenced to criminal punishment.’

Crimmins looked very tense as she arrived to court in the back of a prison van and tried to shield her face with a face mask and hand-held fan as she was escorted inside. 

But her demeanour vastly improved later on in the courtroom when she realised her sentence was lighter than the eight months imprisonment recommended by the prosecutor.

As well as the thefts, the judges also took into account that Crimmins’ crimes caused a disturbance to the community.

Australian teacher Vanessa Louise Crimmins (pictured getting out of a prison van) has learnt her fate for stealing two laptops in a Bali resort town on October 30 last year

Crimmins is pictured handcuffed as she is led into the court in Denpasar on Thursday

But the judges also considered several mitigating factors, including that Crimmins had admitted what she did and had shown her remorse. 

The fact that she had no previous criminal record and that she has two children to support were also taken into account.

Crimmins has already served four months in the notorious Kerobokan Prison, which means she is likely to be freed next month.

She smiled and said ‘thank you’ to the media as she was escorted from the courtroom.

The teacher previously blamed a case of ‘Bali belly’ for the thefts and claimed she never meant to intended to steal the backpacks and laptops.

‘At the beginning, from afar, I saw that there were two bags on the seat (outside the supermarket) and there was nobody watching them,’ she told the court.

‘At that time, I had a problem with my stomach. I had Bali belly. So, I go went home first to the villa.’

Crimmins said she later returned to the supermarket and that ‘the two bags were still on the seat and all the staff were busy’.

Crimmins (pictured) looked very tense as she awaited the verdict in the Balinese court

Vanessa Louise Crimmins is pictured listening as the judgement was read out on Thursday 

She was about to hand a backpack over but had to run to her accommodation to use the toilet and took the bag with her.

‘I was actually sick at that time after surgery. I still take medicine (for it),’ Crimmins told the court.

‘Later on, I went back to the deli … but I could not find the security. There was no security there.’

She saw that the other bag was still on a seat outside the shop. ‘Then I took it. And got problem with my stomach again, so I went home to my villa and brought the second bag.’

When she went back to the store yet again, she wanted to ask what she should do with the bags, but instead she was held on suspicion of theft.

CCTV footage from outside the supermarket appeared to show Vanessa Crimmins picking up two backpacks

Crimmins apologised when asked why she didn’t look for security instead of taking other people’s belongings back to her villa.

‘I was not well at that time. I really apologise. My intention was only to secure (the bags),’ she said.

The bags belonging to Jakarta man Ardi Nurcahyadi, 42, and Denpasar university student Ni Nyoman Ari Purwaningsih, 24 were stolen over a 90-minute period.

CCTV was reviewed after one of the men alerted the Popular Deli security chief that their bag had been taken.

The footage allegedly showed Crimmins taking the man’s bag and a second one an hour later outside the shop.

Police alleged that after the arrest, the stolen bags and computers were found during a search of the North Kuta villa where Crimmins was staying.

 Crimmins (pictured) said ‘thank you’ as she the media after the verdict was delivered

After getting a lighter than expected sentence, Crimmins smiled as she left the court

She has now been returned to Kerobokan to serve remaining weeks of her sentence.

Until recently, the prison held two members of the Bali Nine drug smuggling ring.

Si Yi Chen and Matthew Norman served out their sentences there before they returned to Australia in December.

Bali Nine ringleaders Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran also spent their sentences on Kerobokan’s death row before they were executed in 2015.

It’s also where fellow Aussie Schapelle Corby served the majority of her nine-year jail term after she attempted to smuggle 4.1kg of marijuana in her bodyboard bag through Denpasar Airport in 2004.