An Englishman who stole money from his employer in order to play at online gambling sites has been sentenced to 2 years in prison. The 23 year old Joshua Walwyn plead guilty of stealing £231,383 from Abzorb by issuing checks to his personal bank account and creating fraudulent purchase orders.
Abzorb is a telecoms firm in which Walwyn has been working, and from which he was stealing, for almost two years. As was stated in the Bradford Crown Court, Joshua Walwyn abused his position of trust and stole more than £230,000. The main hearing was held last week and the prosecutor, Dave Mackay, explained the court that the accused not only created false purchase orders, but he also forged signatures on checks. “In total he stole £231,383.09 between January 2013 and October 2014,” added Mr Mackay.
The offending of Walwyn was discovered in October, 2014, when he was on leave. The employees have found many blank cheque stubs and suspected that something was going on. According to the Brighouse firm’s representative, the theft had a significant impact on the company’s cash flow and it created a false impression of its profitability as well.
As Mr Mackay explained to the court, Walwyn told the police that he had a gambling problem and he was feeling sorry for the damage he had done. The only money he had left was £8,000 that the Judge, Neil Davey, ordered to be paid back to Abzorb as compensation.
Judge Davey said that Walwyn was supposed to get a 3 year prison sentence, but his early guilty pleas reduced the sentence by a third. The Judge also pointed out that when the accused started working at the company nobody has ever though that he would end up standing in the dock of a court.