DOUBLE LIFE OF SHAMED BOSS WHO SIPHONED £184,000 FROM NHS
TRUSTED PRACTICE MANAGER WHO PEOPLE LOOKED UP TO WAS A THIEF
A TRUSTED practice manager stole £184,000 of NHS funds from the surgery where she worked, writes Suzy Gibson.
Kirsty Whawell, seen here arriving at Leicester Crown Court to be sentenced to a year in prison, worked her way up to a senior managerial position at Kibworth Medical Centre.
Whawell admitted a series of frauds over a seven-year period and, the court heard, has been “ostracised” by the community. The judge said on the one hand she had been “a person everyone looked up to and yet, on the other hand, throughout that period is a thief.”
A TRUSTED medical practice manager stole £184,000 of NHS money from the surgery where she worked.
Leicester Crown Court was told that Kirsty Whawell had even obtained her job at Kibworth Medical Centre dishonestly, by lying about having no criminal convictions when she had previously stolen from an employer.
Whawell admitted a series of frauds at the medical centre, between 2013 and early 2019.
She wept in the dock during her sentencing hearing, in which she was handed a one-year jail sentence.
The 40-year-old, of Kimberley Street, Kibworth Beauchamp, originally joined the practice as a receptionist and worked her way into a £48,000-a-year senior managerial position with responsibility for the finances.
When applying, she forged a DBS (criminal record) document to conceal a 2008 conviction for misusing an employer’s credit card for her own purposes while working as an au pair.
At the surgery, she gave herself unauthorised salary rises of several thousands and covertly paid herself overtime – while consistently telling colleagues she never claimed for extra hours.
Andrew Scott, prosecuting, said invoices and 53 cheques were falsified to make payments, totalling £126,504, into her own account.
He said she had “a magic pen” to write the names of payees, such as locum medics, or to pay for services.
The surgery’s partners signed them thinking they were legitimate. But Whawell would rub out the false payee names to replace with her own.
The prosecutor said: “It was a sophisticated operation and the invoices were extremely good forgeries, many with postal and email addresses and bank account details on.”
She also used surgery funds to pay her garage bill and for two holiday lettings and wrongly asserted the practice was funding her fertility treatment.
In total, she defrauded Kibworth Medical Centre out of £183,391 and dishonestly took £687 from another local practice, The Two Shires, during a merger of the two surgeries – which is when the discrepancies came to light as accounts were scrutinised.
She was dismissed for gross misconduct in May 2019.
At an earlier hearing, Whawell pleaded guilty to fraud by false representation and six counts of fraud by abuse of position.
Balraj Bhatia QC, mitigating, said references from friends and family spoke highly of her, which revealed a patient, kind and caring side to her nature – and also described her feeling ashamed and remorseful.
She confessed her wrongdoing to the police when interviewed, with overwhelming evidence.
Mr Bhatia said she had been “vilified, abused and ostracised” by her community.
He said that during the offending, married Whawell had “expensive fertility treatment” in desperation to have a child.
He said: “She took money from the practice with a view to paying
it back but that was never a realistic prospect.”
She also helped others out financially and was generous out of “a desire to please people and to make them love her”.
During the pandemic she had been doing charitable work, delivering food supplies to the homeless and secured paid employment relating to Covid vaccinations.
The court heard she had since repaid £780 to the surgery, but Whawell faces a proceeds of crime hearing later in the year, when assets or equity in her home could be confiscated.
Mr Bhatia said: “She’s a thoroughly decent woman who did something dreadfully wrong.”
Sentencing, Recorder Patrick Upward QC said: “This was a very serious breach of trust. You lied in order to do it and lied in order to conceal it.
“References from family and friends make it hard to believe they relate to the same person. On the one hand a person everyone looked up to and yet, on the other hand, throughout that period is a thief.
“You abused your position over a sustained period in a sophisticated nature. The aggravation is in the lies and the different methods of committing the offences.
“The mitigation, I recognise, is substantial and I accept your remorse is genuine.”