Employee stole from credit union customer

Kristie Shantal Hurlston was sentenced last week to 20 months imprisonment for thefts from a customer of the Civil Service Association Co-operative Credit Union, where she had worked as a customer service representative. 

Hurlston, 24, pleaded guilty to stealing $76,000, attempting to steal $5,000, falsifying account records and signing withdrawal slips in the customer’s name. The offences occurred between 1 October, 2011, and 31 January, 2012. 

Crown counsel Michael Snape said the way Hurlston spent the stolen money was possibly the worst use it could be put to: “To put it bluntly, it was spent living the high life,” he said in summarising the case. 

He told Magistrate Kirsty-Ann Gunn that Hurlston had paid for trips to Miami for herself and friends. On one occasion she rented a house there that included a personal chef. Mr. Snape said it was a lifestyle Hurlston could not have afforded. 

Defence attorney Prathna Bodden offered an explanation. She said Hurlston had suffered the death of a close friend: “Her generosity to friends was an attempt to seek that kind of relationship again.” 

Ms Bodden also said that the first offence occurred after the customer signed two withdrawal slips, one in error. Hurlston saw this and took the opportunity to use the other signed withdrawal slip to withdraw $2,500 for herself after completing his legitimate transaction. 

Mr. Snape summarised the other offences. He said that, about a week after using the signed slip, Hurlston went a step further and forged the customer’s signature on a withdrawal slip for $10,000. 

In November, she forged another withdrawal slip, this time for $50,000. She had it transferred into the credit union account of a former school friend. She told the friend she was trying to get a mortgage and the money was from her grandmother, who was trying to help her. 

Other thefts occurred the same way – by forging the customer’s signature on withdrawal slips. When she had cheques prepared instead of taking cash, she would go outside the usual chain of command to get a supervisor’s signature in order to escape closer scrutiny, Mr. Snape said. 

In January 2012, when she took a cheque to Cayman National Bank to cash it, suspicions were raised and the bank contacted the credit union. 

In passing sentence, the magistrate referred to a victim impact statement. She noted that the man from whose account the money was stolen felt that Hurlston had targeted him. The man had deposited a large sum of money from the sale of family land earlier in 2011. He described Hurlston as giving him priority.  

The magistrate noted that Hurlston would have been aware of the man’s significant account balance. The victim was angry and felt he had been befriended deliberately. 

Hurlston had said she did not target him, but his was the only account compromised. The day her employers challenged her, Hurlston asked the man for $5,000 and told him he should say he gave her permission. “Whatever the facts, she cannot deny she exploited the relationship,” the magistrate commented. She found the brazenness of the thefts to be astonishing. 

She also found the use to which the money had been put to be an aggravating feature. 

Another aggravating feature was Hurlston enlisting the help of an unwitting friend and innocent relative. Also aggravating was the impact on staff in terms of lost and diverted man hours and lowered morale. 

Mr. Snape had confirmed that the credit union re-credited the man’s account and assumed the loss. A plan has been set up through Hurlston’s family by which $500 will be paid back to the credit union per month. To date, $3,000 has been repaid and the balance will take 12 years. Meanwhile the credit union will not have interest on the outstanding amount.  

Ms Bodden had said Hurlston was apologetic and embarrassed; in trying to compensate for the loss of her friend, her offences were a cry for help. 

The magistrate said none of this made Hurlston’s case exceptional or unusual so as to cause the court to depart from sentencing guidelines for breach of trust offences. 

Starting at two and a half years, and with credit for guilty pleas, she imposed the 20-month term on theft and made other sentences run concurrently. A social inquiry report had recommended suspending the sentence, but the magistrate found no reason to do so.