Gambling addict took from charity, court told

THE finance assistant for a Devon disability charity abused his position by taking £67,000 to feed his gambling addiction.

Dean Lang, 28, was a trusted and well-liked member of the team at Disability Focus in Totnes when he started to falsify invoices.

He manipulated a spreadsheet containing the details of carers providing services for disabled and vulnerable people by inputting his own bank details.

The money he siphoned was wasted on online slot machines as Lang chased the “always elusive jackpot.”

Lang appeared for sentence at Exeter Crown Court after pleading guilty to a single charge of fraud by abuse of position.

Recorder Hannah Willcocks told him: “You abused your position as a finance assistant for the charity. Up until this time you were very well liked at work. You’ve let them, yourself and everyone down through this offending.

“Everybody accepts it was a result of your gambling addiction which had clearly got completely out of control.”

Lang, of Warbro Road, Torquay, was jailed for 18 months, suspended for two years.

Prosecutor Mr Tom Bradnock said Lang was employed by Disability Focus, a non-for-profit charity, in September 2018. The company managed the finances of 355 disabled care users whose fees were met by the council. The charity received £150,000 a week to pay for carers.

Lang’s responsibility was to manage payments of that money to carers. Carers submitted invoices for services and his job was to input details into a master spreadsheet.

The sheet contained the bank details of those who needed payment. As a live document it could be altered.

Mr Bradnock said: “From June 2019 onwards he falsified a number of invoices from care providers and entered them on the spreadsheet with his own bank account details.”

The full extent of the fraud was exposed in January 2020.

It was found that Lang had submitted 46 invoices worth a total of £66,996.

The NHS trust had become suspicious at a number of duplicate and over payments. An internal investigation initially led to a wholly innocent carer being challenged about duplicate invoices.

“She was able to show she hadn’t got payments,” said the prosecutor. Examination of the spreadsheet revealed links to Lang’s account.

He admitted the fraud when confronted and was dismissed from his job. A pre-sentence report described Lang as an “unhappy individual” who was stuck in a destructive and all consuming cycle of gambling at the time of the offence. He showed genuine remorse and has vowed never to gamble again.

His future job opportunities are now limited. He lived with his diabetic mother and is her registered carer.

Mr Herc Ashowrth, defending, said the defendant had no previous convictions and had previously worked for the NHS as a mental health care worker.

“He is ashamed and wants to apologise to everyone.,” he said. “It was inevitable he would be caught. His actions were those of a blind addict.”

Recorder Willcocks ordered £15,000 set aside by Lang be used to pay compensation to the charity. The defendant was also told to do 100 hours of unpaid work.