Woman jailed 2 years for theft

Fri, 16 Jun 2017 12:55:48 +0000

By CHARLES MUSONDA

A TRAVEL consultant has been jailed two years for stealing thousands of Kwacha and United States dollars belonging to her employer, Gemistar Travel and Tours.

High Court Registrar Aridah Chulu, sitting as chief resident magistrate, jailed Deborah Chifuka, 32, after finding her guilty on 92 counts of fraudulent false accounting and theft by servant..

Ms. Chulu found that after passengers paid cash for air tickets, Chifuka pocketed the money and generated invoices indicating that Standard Chartered Bank would pay for their travel as they were the bank’s employees when in fact not.

She said Chifuka did not dispute that she was the one who generated invoices for walk-in passengers who paid cash for the tickets.

“Clearly the fact is that the accused’s evidence of small recoveries does not tally with what is being alleged because it is not the small amounts of recoveries that is in contention. The amounts in issue relate to fares purported to have been issued to bank employees when in fact the people who travelled were not bank employees and neither were they sponsored by the bank.

“It is a fact that the accused, who was in charge of Standard Chartered transactions, entered false information on the invoices indicating that the bank would pay for the said people when in fact not,” Ms. Chulu said.

She said it was a fact that all the passengers were individuals who went to Gemistar to purchase tickets where cash was the mode of payment and which money was never credited to the company’s account.

“Instead the transactions showed that it was the bank which was going to pay for the travel. I have no doubt whatsoever that the accused had an intention to deprive and she did in fact deprive her employer of the various sums as stated in the indictment. I find the accused guilty as charged,” Ms. Chulu said.

She told Chifuka that she should have realised consequences of not being faithful and sentenced her to two years on each count but the sentences would run concurrently.