The former assistant to the financial controller of a security company has been given a four-year suspended sentence for defrauding the firm of some £100,000. Austin Gethings (40), of Seafield Road, Killiney, Co Dublin, had to sell his home to compensate Modern Security Ltd.
Gethings pleaded guilty to sample charges of stealing cash and a cheque, the property of the company, in 1993 and 1994. Other charges were taken into consideration at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Judge Kieran O'Connor was told a Garda investigation was started when the company lodged a complaint that £100,000 had been defrauded from it.
Gethings made a full statement of admission when interviewed and shown copies of paid cheques and bank statements. He admitted taking presigned cheques and paying sums to himself personally as well as to companies he owned fully or partially.
He said he began taking the money in an attempt to live up to the lifestyle of a senior manager by buying a big car and a big Killiney house. When it was suggested the business would be sold to a US company, he feared he faced unemployment while having heavy financial commitments.
Mr Sean Moylan SC, defending, told Judge O'Connor it had been agreed that if his client paid a certain sum to Modern Security, it would be accepted as compensation for the amount lost. Gethings had sold his Killiney home and had paid over the money as arranged.
Judge O'Connor said Gethings should be "thoroughly ashamed for this appalling fraud" involving large sums of money. He had to sell his home and relied on his wife to provide the family income.
"You now have a criminal record and but for your guilty plea you would be going to prison rather than getting a suspended sentence," Judge O'Connor told him. He directed that £5,000 bail lodged on behalf of Gethings should be released to the defendant's solicitors.