THE QUEEN v. LEUNG YUK-MEI

______________

________________

J U D G M E N T

________________

Macdougall, J. :

1. The applicant, a 38 year-old woman with a.12 year-old child, had been employed by a large import and export company as a cashier from 1981 ro 1987 As such one of her duties was to receive cash and cheques from customers.

2. In March 1987, a senior officer of the company discovered certain accounting irregularities and asked the applicant to give an explanation She then confessed that between 1984 and 1987 she had stolen approximately $920,000 from the company. Three days later, she surrendered herself to the Commercial Crimes Bureau, and eventually was brought before the District Court on 7 charges of theft and 3 charges of false accounting.

3. Accountants brought in by the company to investigate the matter confirmed that indeed $920,000 was missing and discovered that, in carrying out the thefts, the applicant had employed two different techniques. The first was to manipulate the calculator tape used to total the money and cheques received by her each day. The second was to deposit into the bank an amount less than the total shown on the tape.

4. As to the first false accounting charge, it was discovered during the course of an audit in March 1986 that some unpresented cheques were missing from the bank reconciliation for December 1985. On being asked by the company accountant to explain the situation, the applicant requested him to wait while she checked the accounts.  She then searched for and found a receipt in the same amount as the unpresented cheques, namely $212,247, and altered the date to one in December. She inserted this receipt into the bundle relating to December and prepared the correct tape total for that month Having done this she explained to the accountant that, as the money had been received on the last day of December, it had not been paid into the bank in time, and that therefore the amount had not been disclosed in the December reconciliation. Subsequent investigation revealed however that in her haste to alter the receipt to show a day in December, the applicant had omitted to amend the year.

5. The second false accounting charge concerned the making of a false entry in a payment voucher to give the appearance that a sum of $600,000 more than that which had originally been stated on the voucher had been paid to an overseas supplier. Finally, the third such charge related to the alteration of a bank pay-in slip to falsely indicate that $60,000 more than the original and correct amount on the slip had been paid into the bank.

6. When the applicant appeared before His Honour Judge Corcoran, she, pleaded guilty on all charges. Her counsel urged the judge to exercise leniency as it was accepted that she had done her utmost to make restitution by repaying her employer $60,000 and by surrendering jewellery which she had purchased from some of the stolen monies and which was valued at $390,000. He claimed and the judge accepted, that she would forfeit the benefit of a $69,000 provident fund entitlement. The judge also took into account the fact that the applicant had a clear record, had fully cooperated with her employer and the police, and was filled with remorse for what she had done.

7. Notwithstanding the mitigating factors the judge was of the view that neither a probation order nor a suspended sentence was appropriate. He considered that ordinarily a course of criminal behaviour such as that engaged in by the applicant would attract a sentence of 4 years' imprisonment. In view of the mitigating circumstances, however, he decided to impose a total sentence of 21/2 years imprisonment. It is against this overall sentence that the applicant now seeks leave to appeal.

8. She has urged us to take into consideration the fact that she had been employed by the company for 17 years and had behaved in an exemplary manner until 4 years ago when by chance she discovered a loophole in the accounting system that she was able to exploit. Her explanation for committing the offences was that she had succumbed to momentary greed. Moreover, her husband has now been left to support her son and her aged father while she is in prison. It is because of these circumstances that the applicant asks us to exercise mercy and to reduce her sentence so as to allow her to start anew and rebuild her life.

9. It is plain to us that, far from succumbing to momentary greed, the applicant had been engaged in a systematic and ingenious course of theft over a number of years from an employer who had placed her in a position of trust. In those circumstances we do not think that the overall sentence imposed by the judge was either manifestly excessive or wrong in principle. Accordingly, this application is refused.