SHE was a trusted employee with responsibility for counting and banking large sums of money on a regular basis for Wagga’s Ashmont Inn.
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But Debra June Price abused that trust, stealing tens of thousands of dollars from her employer.
Price, 53, pleaded guilty through her solicitor, Zac Tankard, in Wagga Local Court this week to one count of dishonestly obtaining a financial advantage by deception.
Undisputed police facts tendered to the court said Price, of Ashmont, dishonestly obtained about $65,000 from her employer between May 1, 2013, and May 25, 2014.
After the plea was entered, police prosecutor Sergeant Darren Brand withdrew dozens of other dishonesty charges that had been laid against Price relating to the same matter.
At one point, Price was accused of stealing $201,000 between June 1, 2011, and May 31, 2014.
The facts said during the course of the police investigation, Price’s TAB betting account at the pub was examined and it was found she had deposited about $30,000 into it over the charge period.
The pub’s owner first suspected something was wrong in early 2014 when he conducted an audit of his poker machine records.
According to the facts, he found a “considerable discrepancy” between amounts recorded by two electronic monitoring systems and the actual cash retrieved from the machines.
He had a surveillance camera installed in the office where Price worked.
On the mornings of May 19, 23 and 25 the camera recorded Price working alone in the office performing daily reconciliation duties.
“On each of these dates and while conducting these duties the offender removed small amounts of Australian currency located either in the safe or a nearby work bench and placed these Australian notes inside the pocket of her clothing,” the facts said.
The pub owner calculated Price had stolen $700 over the three days.
Police were called in and arrested Price on May 29.
She had worked at the Ashmont Inn for eight years, but she was sacked the day she was arrested.
After Price’s arrest, police began to dig deeper into her activities at the hotel.
“These investigations revealed that the offender dishonestly obtained sums of cash from the takings of the poker/gaming machines and then completed daily reconciliation sheets minus the cash amounts taken by her,” the facts said.
“The daily reconciliation sheets did not match the electronically-recorded figures, but did match the cash amounts banked by the offender.”
Price will be sentenced on December 9 after the preparation of a pre-sentence report.
