£28,000 fraudster trapped by greed

Gurjinder Gill was given a full-time job with the company after impressing bosses with a flair for figures while on a short-term contract.

But the 35-year-old father of two repaid that trust by turning to crime before being trapped by his own greed, Wolverhampton Crown Court heard.

Gill, of Sandringham Avenue, Willenhall, discovered that a firm called Intoto Utilities had gone into liquidation while owed a considerable amount of money by Wolverhampton-based Carillion, explained Mr Robert Edwards, prosecuting.

The fiddling financial analyst told his boss that a man called Martin Wright was chasing the cash on behalf of the liquidator.

Gill then created a fake email from the non-existent person, which was sent to Carillion asking for the outstanding debt to be settled and providing details of a bank account into which the money should be paid.

He produced a bogus invoice supposedly from the liquidator with a fake signature from one of his managers approving the transaction. Gill made his mistake on August 13 last year by emailing a Carillion IT expert asking for help in matching payments to debts on the firm's computer system.

His colleague knew this had nothing to do with the job of a financial analyst and raised the alarm, triggering an internal probe that unearthed the bogus invoice.

This payment was stopped but inquiries revealed another £28,675 had been paid through a similar ruse without being spotted. Gill was quizzed by bosses on October 2 last year and admitted what he had done and police were called. He explained that he was in financial difficulty after a burglary at his uninsured home.

Mr Matthew O'Brien, defending, said the attempt to steal a further £55,000 was the result of greed. The defendant had since got another job without revealing details of the court case, he added.

A claim that a man called Marcus had helped set up the scam was dismissed as fantasy by Judge Amjad Nawaz.

Gill admitted fraud totalling £28,675 and pleaded guilty to submitting a fake invoice for £5,5244. The judge told him: "You knew the weaknesses of their system and took advantage of them."