Fraudster jailed for four years
A FINANCE manager stole hundreds of thousands of pounds from his employers to fund his luxury lifestyle, buying holidays, a house and pedigree kittens, a court heard..
Matthew Farrimond, who held a senior role at a construction firm, was jailed for four years after pocketing a total of £369,000 of the company’s revenue under the pretence of charity donations.
The 41-year-old used £150,000 of the swindled money to put a deposit on a new-build property in Buckshaw Village, Chorley, plus pedigree kittens and holidays.
The court heard that Farrimond, who worked for Bolton-based construction firm Herbert T Forrest, began living beyond his means, resulting in him taking the company’s money to maintain his plush lifestyle. Suspicions arose over Farrimond’s behaviour after the finance manager, who had worked for the company since 2010, was found in possession of two cheque stubs for large payments to charities which had not been planned.
Further investigations by the company revealed that the money had in fact been paid to Farrimond’s personal account, rather than the charity listed on the cheque.
The court heard that Farrimond had made a total of nine payments from the business account into his own funds and created false invoices in an attempt to conceal this from the company.
Farrimond was arrested in January during a Greater Manchester Police investigation conducted by fraud specialists. He originally denied the allegations, claiming to have been doing work ‘off the books,’ but at a pre-trial hearing on June 1 Farrimond changed his pleas to guilty. At Bolton Crown Court on Monday, Farrimond was sentenced to four years for 12 counts of fraud by false representation and one count of money laundering.
Pc Kate Riley, of GMP’s economic crime section, said: “Farrimond’s role was to safeguard the financial interests of the company he worked for, but he was the biggest threat to their hardearned funds. That he would deceitfully take money from the company he worked for is one thing, but he should be ashamed of the fact he hid his fraud by pretending to pay charities.”
A spokesperson for Forrest Construction Firm said: “The company is satisfied with the outcome and thankful that the case is now closed.”