A former assistant manager at Grant Thornton has been jailed for 40 months after embezzling more than £726,000 intended to go to charity.
Susan McMahon, 34 from Motherwell, North Lanarkshire, had pleaded guilty at Glasgow Sheriff Court (pictured) to diverting away the money from trusts that had been set up to help charities.
She spent the money on designer clothes and luxury items, which she then gave to charity shops to hide the spending from her family. The court heard no money has been repaid.
McMahon worked for Grant Thornton between 2006 and 2013, and during that time she falsified documents so her superiors would authorise cheques, believing that trustees had agreed the money would go to various beneficiaries such as Save the Children.
The trusts that lost money were the Margaret Murdoch Charitable Trust, The Morrison Foundation, Mr J Anderson, Mrs J Anderson, Mrs JMC Smith and Adam Boyd. Money was paid out to her or her husband's accounts. Her husband had no knowledge of his wife’s crimes.
She was caught in April 2013 when one partner at Grant Thornton became suspicious after authorising a cheque for £15,000 to be paid to an Aberdeen sports charity and realising that the project the funds had been approved for did not fit with the purpose of the charity receiving the donation.
McMahon had claimed that the Margaret Murdoch Trust had authorised the payment, but on checking with them he discovered that no such payment had been approved.
A spokesman for Grant Thornton said: "Grant Thornton, together with its insurers, is in the course of addressing compensation arrangements with the affected trusts in respect of the losses they have been shown to have incurred by reason of Mrs McMahon’s criminal activity.
“Whilst not wishing to be anything other than helpful, you will appreciate that Grant Thornton is constrained by obligations of confidence from disclosing any further details in relation to such arrangements.
“We are of course aware that at the sentencing hearing in the Glasgow Sheriff Court, Mrs McMahon was sentenced to 40 months in prison. This is a decision of the court on which we will not comment.”
