Stacy Campbell is accused of a TD Canada Trust Bank in Barrie, Ontario. (Tracy McLaughlin, QMI Agency)

BARRIE, Ont. - Stacy Campbell was "desperate" to come up with the downpayment on her dream home after gambling away thousands of dollars at Georgian Downs, a Crown attorney said yesterday.

"She was desperate, and so she decided to rob a bank," Dave Russell said in his closing arguments.

Stacy Campbell is charged with robbing the TD Canada Trust Bank on Big Bay Point Road in Barrie just before it opened Jan. 26, 2006.

Court heard it was a cold, blustery day when senior teller Tracy Austin showed up to open the branch when suddenly a woman with a scarf hiding her face held a knife to her throat.

"Don't do anything funny," the robber said.

Austin said she couldn't get into the bank vault without another teller who had part of the vault code.

"We'll wait," said the robber, calmly waiting until Austin let the other tellers into the bank.

With the butcher knife drawn, the robber ordered the tellers to open the bank vault and get inside. She ordered Austin to stuff a gym bag with bundles of cash totaling about $100,000, then turned and said, "thank you," to the terrified women, and quietly fled.

Later that same day, police confirmed Stacy Campbell showed up at three Canada Post outlets and three banks, with plastic grocery bags stuffed with cash, and purchased drafts totaling $72,000, which were used as a payment for a new home that she and her family moved into the next day.

Campbell told one bank manager it was savings she kept in a shoe box in a closet.

"But there is no shoebox in the world big enough to hold that amount of cash," Crown attorney Russell said.

But Campbell's defence lawyer, Mike Miller, insisted Campbell would never rob a bank and then go spend the money the same day in the same community.

"Who could be that stupid?" he asked.

Miller said Campbell could not have robbed the bank because her 13-year-old son testified she drove him to hockey practice that morning, then later drove him to school.

"Her alibi is solid," he said.

Justice Michelle Fuerst will announce her verdict Dec. 3.