Security guard’s sentence quashed
A security guard who raided $180,000 from an ATM, went on a shopping spree, then buried the rest of his loot in his garden, has had his sentence slashed.
Tony John Williams, who was aggrieved over a workplace injury from lifting a bag of coins, was jailed by Christchurch District Court Judge Tom Gilbert for two years and two months in December.
He successfully appealed to the High Court, had his sentence cut by four months and was granted the right to apply for home detention.
Williams appealed his sentence at a hearing on April 19, arguing that the starting point was ‘‘too high’’. Judge Gilbert had already cut the sentence for Williams’ willingness to attend restorative justice, his selfreferral to the Salvation Army for treatment, payment of reparation and his guilty plea.
Williams had been an employee of nationwide security company Armourguard for two-and-a-half years.
In the early hours of January 2016, he went into a laundromat in Rolleston, near Christchurch, using a key and alarm codes taken from his work and unlocked the rear of an adjacent bank’s ATM machine before removing two cassettes containing $50 and $20 notes – cash totalling $179,300.
He dumped the cassettes in a Halswell stream and resigned from the security firm three days later.
Williams buried $130,000 in his garden and $10,000 in the house. He spent about $38,000 on groceries, cigarettes, alcohol, flights, tattoos, concert tickets and other goods and services and paid off his personal debt.
When police spoke to him, he led them to the buried cash. They recovered $141,331 from his address and his vehicle.
His sentence of two years and two months was quashed, replaced with a sentence of one year and 10 months’ imprisonment.
His application for home detention was also granted, once an address became available.