Credit union boss in £180k fraud is jailed for 2 years
A CREDIT union boss who stole more than £180,000 over 18 years by forging friends’ signatures on bogus loan applications and embezzling cash has been jailed for two years.
Anne Costello, 67, pocketed cash from the Cumbernauld South Credit Union after falling into debt.
She used her position to make false loan applications and failed to deposit money into accounts. Her deception unravelled after she took £77,000 from John Martin, 79, who she met at the home of a mutual friend. She promised to deposit cash into his account, but took it herself.
Costello, of Cumbernauld, Lanarkshire, confessed when confronted by the widower’s suspicious daughters, but begged them not to report it. However, police were called in and a probe discovered she had also embezzled £39,095 from Lorraine Febers, 68; £19,298 from Anne Daly, 77; £3,588 from Anne Provan, 66; and £1,232 from Marrion Cassidy, 77. They were all friends.
She also used forged details of Mr Martin, Yvonne Murray and Carissa Bovill to apply for bogus loans of more than £40,000.
Costello admitted a string of embezzlement and forgery charges between October 1999 and June 2017 totalling £180,718 when she appeared at Airdrie Sheriff Court last month. She was yesterday sentenced to two years in prison at the same court.
The court heard she had failed to pay any of the money back and the credit union had to claim on an insurance policy to reimburse its members.
Depute fiscal Elizabeth Ross said: ‘She admitted she stole the money from Mr Martin, failed to put it in his account and kept it for herself, adding “I’m sorry, it is like I’m a different person. I will pay the money back”. All of the other
‘She was just helping herself’
complainers knew the accused well and trusted her.’
James Sloan, defending, said Costello was ‘ashamed of her behaviour’.
Jailing her, Sheriff Derek O’Carroll said: ‘A credit union provides an important alternative to expensive insurance and helps people avoid exploitation. Instead, you put yourself in a senior position and took advantage of it to help yourself.’
A relative of one of the victims said: ‘She always came across as a very honest, genuine, religious person who would always try to help people out, but little did we know she was just helping herself.’