ALLEGED THEFT AS SERVANT

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25859, 19 July 1949, Page 8

ALLEGED THEFT AS SERVANT

CLERK APPEARS ON FIVE CHARGES Eight witnesses gave evidence for the prosecution yesterday when Robert David Hastie, aged 22, a clerk, appeared before Mr F. F. Reid, S.M., in the Magistrate’s Court on charges that, being a servant of the New Zealand Farmers’ Co-opera-tive Association of Canterbury, Ltd., he stole £4 14s 6d on December 16.’ 1948; £l7 12s 6d on February ’ll; £lO on February 25; £9 14s 6d on March 31; and £9 2s on ' April 8; and that he attempted to steal ; £3 8s on May 16, all the sums stated being the property of the association. Four witnesses have still to be heard to-day, when the hearing of the charges will be continued. Detective-Sergeant G. W. Altv is conducting the prosecution. Mr R. A. Young, and with him Mr H. W. Hunter, is appearing for the accused. Reginald Alfred Ernest Brett, manager of the motor division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Co-operative Association. Ltd., at Christchurch, said that the accused was a servant of the association from 1945 until May 18, 1949. For a period he was a storeman-clerk in the spare parts department. Dockets were made out for cash sales and it was the duty of the accused to look after the cash in the till and the cash records. He had to enter the total cash sales for a day on a special index card. The accused would then take the cash each evening to the workshops office, and pay it to a clerk there; it would be checked and the index cards initialled as a receipt. The index cards for the five days stated in the first five charges were missing and could not be found. The index cards and the cash docket books were the accused’s responsibility. Hastie had never made any complaint that his cash wouid not balance. Had the system been carried out it would have been impossible to defraud the association, but the cash sale dockets were not checked by anyone against the index cards and that was where the system fell down. Wilfred Percy Steel, internal auditor at Christchurch for the association, said he carried out a check in the spares department on May 17 and found a discrepancy between the amounts entered on certain cash sales dockets and the corresponding index cards. The sum of £1 Ils on a cash docket was entered on the index card as Is, and another sum of £2 was entered as 2s. These would indicate that £3 8s had been short paid by the accused. The accused said he might have made a mistake through pressure of work. Later the accused said he had found some money in a bag at the back of the cash drawer. The accused produced the bag and in it was £3 7s. Witness then made an audit of the accounts in the spares department. The cash sales dockets for December 16. 1948, showed a total of ; £6 19s 9d. but the receipts for the money paid in to the office were for £2 5s 3d. leaving a shortage of £4 14s 6d. The cash sales dockets for February 11 showed a total of £2O 18s 7d, but the pay-in receipt for the same day was for £3 6s Id, showing a shortage of £l7 12s 6d. The cash sales dockets for February 25 showed a total of £5O 16s 4a, but the pay-in receipt was for £4O 16s 4d. showing a shortage of £lO. The cash sales dockets for March 31 totalled £l4 19s 6d. but the pay-in"receint was for £5 ss, showing a shortage of £9 14s 6d. On April 8 the cash sales dockets totalled £l3 19s Id. but the pay-in receipt was for £4 17s Id. showing a short- I age of £9 2s. Six other members of the association’s j staff gave evidence on the system used i and on the dockets and index cards pro- | duced in Court, and the nearing was ad- . journed until to-day.