Workers caught stealing from employers and community group
Funds set aside for expensive habits, fake transfers, schemes to plunder stock and good old-fashioned cash pocketing. This is how these Wide Bay Burnett employees were caught out for their dishonest actions.
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It’s any business owner’s nightmare: employees who seem outwardly trustworthy but under the sweet exterior they are stealing from you.
The penny pinching Doughnut King worker who took thousands; the service manager with a $1600 a week cocaine habit; the kindergarten committee president with big plans; and the touch football club treasurer who made thousands of dollars disappear - these 10 people from across the Wide Bay and Burnett wanted more than was their due, and paid the price for it.
Here’s the list of some of the employees who faced the courts in recent times after being caught stealing from their bosses.
Justin Clive Fankenhauser
A simple stock audit was responsible for uncovering a Bundaberg man’s elaborate scheme of purchasing items on an employer’s account for his own business and falsifying documents to cover his tracks.
Justin Clive Fankenhauser pleaded guilty in Bundaberg Magistrates Court in September 2022 to one count of fraudulently falsifying or destroying records and one count of stealing by clerks or servants.
Fankenhauser had been employed by Formatt Machinery as a sales, service and parts manager when he committed his crimes over a three-and-a-half year period from November 2018 to June 2022.
The court heard he falsified inventory records and adjusted stock quantities to cover up his offending.
The audit discovered $62,283.48 was unaccounted for.
He broke into tears when confronted by his employer, and said he had a $1600 a week cocaine habit.
Fankenhauser was sentenced to six months’ jail, suspended for 18 months.
He was ordered to pay $25,000 restitution to his former employer within seven days.
This was part of a total $50,000 in compensation agreed to between Fankenhauser and his employer, with the remainder paid when he handed over ownership of a $25,000 trailer.
More details here.
Karma Melissa Donald
Plans to buy an old hospital and convert it to a community hub ended in court when the president of a kindergarten committee co-opted $50,000 for her own purposes.
Karma Melissa Donald, 44, pleaded guilty to one count of fraud when she faced Hervey Bay District Court in June 2023.
The court was told Donald was the president of the committee of Carramar Community Kindergarten and Preschool.
A campaign to transform to buy the hospital and transform it ensued, the court heard.
When the sale fell through the funds were not returned.
She instead paid $10,000 into her deceased mother’s bank account, withdrew another $20,000, and made a cheque to another person with the remainder as a gift.
A new kindergarten president elected in 2018 began asking questions about anomalies in the books.
Donald was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison, wholly suspended for four years.
She was ordered to pay $25,000 in compensation.
More details here.
Jennifer Ann Murchie
A Kingaroy mother of five was jailed after stealing more than $24,000 from a community sporting club and refusing to say what she did with it.
Jennifer Ann Murchie, 48, pleaded guilty in Kingaroy Magistrates Court in June 2022 to seven counts of stealing by clerks or servants.
The court heard it was unlikely the money would be paid back despite her pleas of remorse, as she refused to say what it was used for.
Murchie was the treasurer of the touch football club where her children played at the time of her stealing.
From July to December 2018 she took cash payments made by players, the court was told, with the money never reaching the club’s bank account.
Murchie was sentenced to 18 months’ jail, with a parole release date three months after her sentencing.
More details here
Ian Andrew Phillips and Tony Charles Freeman
A Rainbow Beach resort manager was jailed after using rent money owed to unit owners to pay his own business debts.
Ian Andrew Phillips, 67, pleaded guilty in the Brisbane District Court in July 2022 to wrongful conversion or false accounts.
The court was told Phillips and a friend bought the management rights to the resort for $1 with a plan to sell them for profit.
Phillips’ role included being the account holder of a trust into which money belonging to unit owners was initially paid.
However it became clear shortly after taking over there was not enough money available to pay off the resort’s debts.
The pair then took out $219,128.22 in small increments through a sophisticated scheme which included disabling an automatic payment computer system and creating false entries of unpresented cheques.
Phillips was jailed for three years, with the sentence to be suspended after six months.
His partner, 66-year-old Tony Charles Freeman, was sentenced to two-and-a-half years jail with the sentence suspended immediately.
More details here.
Brayden Alex Cooper
A Hervey Bay security guard was handed a stiff fine when he eschewed protecting his employer’s possessions and stole them instead.
Brayden Alex Cooper, 23, pleaded guilty in Hervey Bay Magistrates Court in June 2022 to one count of stealing as a servant.
Cooper had been employed at a marine services business when he took the items, including a number of tools, from an area only accessible with a pass, the court heard.
He later told police he had taken the tools “to do some woodwork”.
The court was told he did not intend to return them.
He was fined $2000.
More details here.
Jessica Tahlay Brooke McMaster
A Granville woman caught dunking into Donut King’s tills has been ordered to do community service and repay the almost $5000 taken.
Jessica Tahlay Brooke McMaster, 21, pleaded guilty in Maryborough Magistrates Court in August 2023 to a charge of stealing by a clerk or servant.
McMaster stole from the business on five occasions, the court was told, and was finally dismissed in October 2022.
She worked closing shifts and accessed the money in the registers and the store’s safe.
McMaster, who had no previous criminal history, was placed on probation for 15 months, ordered to do 100 hours of community service, and pay $4785.66 in compensation.
More details here.
Joshua Alty
A smoker who swiped more than $10,000 worth of tobacco from his employer avoided jail after being told by a magistrate it was an “awful lot” to be smoking.
Joshua Alty, 29, pleaded guilty in August 2022 to one count of stealing by clerks and servants.
The thefts were carried across over a month while Alty worked for a refrigerated trucking company.
Magistrate Peter Cooke said the thefts were carried out in a “planned” but “unsophisticated” manner.
Alty was sentenced to 12 months’ jail, suspended for two years.
He was ordered to repay $10,573.93
More details here.
No convictions recorded below
Gail Mary Catherine Mole
A charity worker told police she was allowed to stash money away instead of in the till and give items away for free.
Gail Mary Catherine Mole, 58, pleaded guilty int Bundaberg Magistrates Court in November 2022 to six counts of stealing by clerks and servants.
The court heard Mole’s offending started on Australia Day when she took clothes and toys from the Second 2 None op shop.
Five days later she put $20 paid by a customer for items in a drawer, and then placed it in her handbag at the end of her shift.
Over the next few days Mole continued to put payments aside, with the court hearing she reasoned she had the authority to do so.
Mole, who had no criminal history, was fined $700 and placed on a $200 recognisance on condition she be on good behaviour for 18 months.
No conviction was recorded.
More details here
Rhys Ian Patrick Geddes
A Domino’s employee found himself in hot water when he stole a slice of profits after a late shift.
Rhys Ian Patrick Geddes, 26, pleaded guilty to one count of stealing by clerks or servants when he faced Hervey Bay Magistrates Court in December 2021.
The court heard he was working as a shift manager at Torquay’s Domino’s store when the incident happened.
He had been scheduled to work the day of the shift, but turned it down to collect his great grandmother from Bundaberg.
Geddes instead went in that night and offered to close up.
He was caught on CCTV placing items in his pockets, and the till was later found to be down $184.
Geddes was fined $500 and was ordered to pay $100 in restitution.
No conviction was recorded
More details here
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