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Woman jailed for £39,000 theft
Date published: 21 February 2013
A ROYTON woman has been jailed for four years for stealing more than £39,000 from her employers of more than 25 years.
Sally Etchells (45) of Church Street, was found guilty at Bolton Crown Court of two counts of fraud.
She was office manager for vehicle bodybuilding firm Ken Rosebury Limited, Rochdale, where she was responsible for payroll and general financial transactions.
In November 2010, when Etchells was off work for a day, the company manager checked the payroll and noticed £25 had been paid into the defendant’s personal account. Inquiries showed further payments to her friends.
The company found that between April 2008 and November 2010, Etchells had overpaid herself by more than £25,000 — including more than £1,800 to a woman who stabled her seven horses.
After being confronted at work, Etchells was asked to leave - erasing the company payroll system to try to remove any trace of her thefts before she went.
She was later found to have paid another £14,000 into her own account over three years — disguising the transfers as payments to other companies and the Inland Revenue.
Det-Con Mark Zebrowski, from Rochdale CID, said: “Etchells was a trusted member of staff. She took large amounts of money at the time the workforce was on a three-day week fighting to keep their jobs.
“Her actions nearly caused the closure of a respected and trusted local company which employs over 30 people.”
Comments
This is a correct decision by the judge, unlike the 9 million pound asian woman who got a slap on the wirst. This is all about the inconsistancey in the courts and this is a great example.
The british penal system is a joke and well said Fitton Hill, at least this judge took the correct action, shame others don't.
A typical example of someone trying to live beyond their means who then turn to crime but it was unforgiveable of her to try and deliberately ruin her employer who had trusted her for 25 yrs, for this alone 4yrs was not enough.
@Fittonhill please compare like with like. The woman given a suspended sentence in the £9m case was not prosecuted for theft but for being in possession of stolen goods. If you do some research I think you will find that the thieves in that case were given custodial sentences. Whether or not the punishment for being in possession was adequate or not is another issue.
she should be made to sell any assets to pay this money back,including her house.
At the end of the day, this woman stole money. A four year sentence is incredibly harsh in relative terms.
You can take a life through negligence and get far less.
we all know what @Fittonhill is trying to say and how courts seem to give lighter sentences to certain members of our community and I for one agree with that,but I think JMTS will put me right.
@Ernie. Fittonhill was trying to prove a myth that members of the ethnic minority community are treated more leniently by the courts than the indigenous majority. He cannot do that by comparing those two cases as one was about theft and the other was about possessing stolen goods. It is my recollection that the thieves in that case received a significant custodial sentence.
@ProDriver: "At the end of the day, this woman stole money. A four year sentence is incredibly harsh in relative terms." What a ludicrous comment. This woman almost bankrupted a business which would have resulted in many job losses. She committed her thefts over a lengthy period without any regard to her workmates. And even after being caught her deviousness persisted without any sign of contrition. The despicable woman deserved at least ten years not four.
yet again the winners are the criminals more thieves are geting away with a slap wrist a little jail time and when they come out the do gooders will make sure they get a job home and all the help they need, good citizens pay a high price for insurance policies that companies have to claim then pass on to their customers and bear the cost of lost revenue caused by greedy thieves seems crime does pay take note of how many thieves are published in todays paper
Have Your Say
As the money is proceeds of a crime ihope she is made to pay back every penny she stole.
By oldhamgent @ 21/02/2013 12:25:06