Disaster wrought by trusted employee who stole almost £700K from the firm
An accountant at a family-run company who stole £678,000 from her employer for her own financial gain has recently been jailed for five years. Donnamarie Wood was working as an accountant at Concept Display Systems when she stole the money over a period of four years.
Wood was charged with fraud by false representation, and concealing, disguising, converting, transferring or removing criminal property between January 2019 and July 2023. She was also charged with false accounting between May 2020 and July 2023.
Her actions eventually led to the company going into liquidation, which caused the company’s owner, Richard Stretton, whose father had founded the business, to feel “betrayed” by the employee he had previously trusted enough to look after his young son.
Mr Stretton told the court that Wood’s actions had left him “speechless and horrified” and had led to his developing stomach issues, alopecia and mental health problems due to the stress of it all.
Speaking after the sentencing, a West Mercia Police spokeswoman said that fraud investigations are often complex and lengthy, so the investigators were pleased to see Wood brought to trial.
Roger Isaacs, National Technical Director of NIFA, said that cases like this show how devastating employee fraud can be, particularly for family-run businesses where there are high levels of trust, personal friendships and an absence of formal internal controls that can feel unnecessarily bureaucratic.
He adds, “What makes offences like this so damaging is that they are rarely just about the money. When a trusted employee is able to manipulate records over a long period, the impact on the business owners can be severe, affecting their health, their families and, in some cases, the survival of the businesses themselves.
“From a forensic accounting perspective, these fraud cases typically succeed because one individual has too much control over the accounting process, allowing them to create false entries and conceal irregular transactions.
“Once a suspicion has been raised, it is often relatively easy to see how the fraud has been perpetrated but by that point the losses can be catastrophic. While no system can remove risk entirely, regular scrutiny of financial information and periodic independent checks can make it far harder for this type of abuse to continue unchecked. Early detection, even of seemingly small irregularities, can stop more serious fraud in its tracks before the damage becomes irreversible.”
Sources: West Mercia Police
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