7 days ago
Crooked finance manager who stole £140,000 from employers to pay back £72,000
Crooked finance manager who stole £140,000 from employers to pay back £72,000
Victoria King, 56, paid herself an extra £7,500 a month by fiddling the books
Victoria King, as known as Vikki Phillips, pictured in 2011
A crooked finance manager who stole £140,000 from her employers years after being jailed for leaving another employer out of pocket has been ordered to pay back £72,000. She was already on a £45,000-a-year salary but paid herself an extra £7,500 a month by fiddling the books and creating payments to what looked to be a genuine supplier but was in fact herself.
Victoria King, 56, who is also known as Vikki Phillips, was jailed in 2014 for stealing £130,000 from a charity she was working for and went on to forge "glowing" references from her victims which she used to apply for another job in finance.
In 2021 King joined the Rhigos office of Eftech Ltd, a company which supplies adhesives and sealants to the automotive industry, as finance manager. For the latest court reports sign up to our crime newsletter.
She said in that £45,000-a-year role the defendant was responsible for making payments to the firm's suppliers and had access to the company's Lloyds bank account.
In April 2023 the defendant quit her job and the Belgium-based company decided not to replace her but to subsume the Welsh office's finance operations into the Belgian operations.
As part of the transition process a financial review was carried out which involved checking invoices and payments at the Rhigos office.
The audit highlighted discrepancies in the numbers and the boss of the Rhigos branch was asked to carry out an investigation.
The internal probe ultimately uncovered 21 payments made between October 2021 and July 2023 to an account which had a name almost identical to that of a genuine supplier.
In total £140,197 had been paid into the account, which was controlled by King, usually in monthly amounts of £7,500.
The police were alerted and the defendant was interviewed but answered "no comment" to all questions asked.
In a statement from the current boss of the Rhigos office he described King's behaviour as "despicable".
He said the offending had led to a "breakdown of trust" which was a shame as the firm had always been a close-knit company where often generations of the same family had chosen to work.
He said King had been happy to talk to people about her horses and the holidays she was taking and that the offending was done simply out of greed.
King, of Highdale Crescent, Llantrisant, Pontyclun, had previously pleaded guilty to fraud by abuse of position when she appeared in the dock for sentencing. The court heard she has two previous convictions for two offences.
She was sentenced to 32 months in prison at Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court in May.
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A Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) hearing at the same court on Wednesday heard King benefited to the tune of £145,197 as a result of her offending but only has assets worth £72,657.
Judge Vanessa Francis ordered the defendant to pay that sum within three months or serve an additional two years imprisonment in default.
