School Employee Steals £31K to Support Bingo Habit

Claire Mosby, 38, a Leeds primary school worker took her managerial position in the office and siphon £31,000 from the school safe over a period of two years.

She is on trial at Leeds Crown court and the prosecuting attorney Peter Hampton claims the offense took place between March 2009 and March 2011. During that time Mosby was in charge of the finances and took in the school cash. The money was from the parents of students to pay for dinners, after school programs and trips for the pupils.

Mosby denies ever taking the money as Mr. Hampton said the cash missing was funds for the school’s nursery, breakfast club, voluntary club and contributions to fund school trips.

Suspicions were raised when low income levels in the dinners money account was discovered by Kate Davison, the council-employed school finance over. When Davison tried a meeting with Mosby to discuss the low funds she described her as being “obstructive”.

Checking into the accounts records Davison realized that there was over £17,000 missing and when questioning Mosby about the shortage she couldn’t offer an explanation.

After checking the school safe envelopes marked with Mosby handwriting were discovered to have the money missing and she was immediately dismissed the following day and police were notified in March 2011.

Bank statements revealed that transactions were made to online bingo and gambling sites and payments to loan companies. Cash withdrawals were also made at ATM machines near Mecca Bingo in Leeds.

According to Mosby she realized the money was missing from the safe but claims she had nothing to do with it.