The Magistrate in Burwood Local Court found our 27 year old client from Blacktown ‘not guilty’ of ‘steal property as clerk / servant’ charges and then ordered police to pay our client’s legal costs.
Our client was the Manager of a Factory Outlet Centre in Homebush Bay.
Police alleged that she defrauded her employer of more than $46,000 over a 15 month period by transferring monies into false bank accounts and claiming that they were customer refunds.
They alleged that the refunds were clearly fraudulent because no garments were actually returned.
The defence argued that there was insufficient evidence to prove that our client created the fake bank accounts or benefited from the transactions.
The Magistrate accepted our argument, finding that the prosecution could not disprove that other employees may have created the accounts and received the funds.
The Magistrate dismissed the case against our client and then ordered police to pay her legal costs on the basis they did not properly investigate the possibility that the accounts may have been created by other employees.