Teller Won Lottery, Refunded Theft

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29802, 19 April 1962, Page 13

Teller Won Lottery, Refunded Theft

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

SYDNEY, April 18.

When a young Sydney bank teller won £lOO,OOO in a lottery he was more than £12,500 short at his bank, the Central Court was told today. He had used about £35,000 of bank money gambling on Sydney racecourses.

The teller, Kerry John Corcoran, aged 25, was committed for sentence after he pleaded guilty to a charge of having stolen £A12,580 from the Balgowlah branch of the Bank of New South Wales. The police prosecutor, Sergeant D. Goode said Corcoran was alleged to have told police he took from £5OO to £lOOO from the bank each week-end by forging withdrawals, Sergeant Goode said that after winning the Sydney Opera House lottery on February 4 this year Corcoran handed over to the bank a cheque for £38.746. This was to cover the amount he estimated he had taken, plus £3750 advanced to him by

the bank for the purchase of his home. The Court was told that the bank's inspector had been able to detect a shortage of only £ 12,580, and that the remainder of the money from Corcoran’s cheque would be returned to him. Corcoran allegedly told police he had been married only three years and got into financial difficulties trying to live as a single man, "going to clubs with the boys and doing my -money on the poker machines." Corcoran was allowed bail of £lOOO.