02/10/2024
An ex-finance officer at a local council has been jailed after he stole almost £1m to fund his gambling addiction.
Alan Doig, 57, abused his position at Gedling Borough Council to transfer £934,343.30 into his own bank accounts between 2003 and 2022.
Nottingham Crown Court heard Doig was employed as a Senior Assistant Accountant and was responsible for the council’s creditors system, which included the ability to generate invoices and make payments to suppliers.
Over a near 20-year period, Doig established a highly sophisticated system to divert regular payments from council accounts using his knowledge of the organisation and his position of trust. His understanding of financial systems gave him the ability to bypass the systems designed to prevent fraud and without it being flagged as suspicious for many years.
The fraud was discovered when discrepancies were found within the financial systems by a colleague. This initiated an internal investigation which showed substantial amounts of funds were diverted into two different bank accounts belonging to Doig.
He was suspended with immediate effect and, after an internal investigation, was dismissed from his position with the council.
We were informed and a search warrant was carried out at Doig’s home address on 6 October 2022.
Doig attended a voluntary interview and was questioned under caution. He made initial admissions, and as the investigation continued went on to make further admissions when additional information was presented, stating he had stolen vast sums of money between 2003 and 2022 to fund his gambling addiction – and that he’d spent all the money on various online gambling sites.
The investigation found he had facilitated 86 fraudulent transactions to the value of £934,343.30.
Doig, of Bedale Road, Daybrook, went on to plead guilty to obtaining a money transfer by deception and fraud by abuse of position.
At his sentencing hearing today (2 October), Doig’s defence counsel said he felt “truly embarrassed and ashamed” of his actions, adding gambling had led him down a “long and dark path”.
Jailing him for five years, Judge Nirmal Shant KC said he had stolen the equivalent of 6% of the council's entire budget for one year.
She told him: “Gedling Borough Council provides a wide range of services to its residents. Although it has a significant budget, it is under huge pressure like all other councils.
“Within that organisation, you were a popular and credible individual who rose to a senior position of trust.
“You gained knowledge and expertise – but what you did with that knowledge and expertise was to use it to manipulate the system for your own gain.
“This was theft by you with a real and significant impact on each of the residents who live within that borough.
“You stole from them. You squandered their money on gambling.”
Following the sentencing, Detective Constable Nabeel Dad, of our fraud investigation unit, said: “As a long-serving and trusted senior member of staff, Doig had a high level of access and understanding of the financial systems utilised by Gedling Borough Council.
“He was trusted to safeguard the financial interests of the council, instead he abused that trust in the most appalling way.
“Over a prolonged period spanning almost 20 years, Doig defrauded the council – and by default hard working taxpayers – out of a large amount of public money.
“The money should have benefited the community and gone towards local services but instead it went towards his spiralling gambling habit.
“He did express remorse throughout the investigation, and I hope this case serves as a reminder to people of how gambling can get out of control and ruin lives.”
Gedling Borough Council’s Chief Executive Mike Hill said: “Our organisation is in shock that we are the victims of a crime carried out by a long serving employee, who was in position of trust, and who abused the system to commit fraud on such a scale. This was a criminal act and the sentencing reflects the crime and we believe that justice has been served.
“Only someone with key insider knowledge could have done this, and we would not have been able to prevent this from happening. We had numerous checks and controls in place, we were subjected to regular and thorough audits of processes and procedures. It was only when legislation changes came in that required new checks, as well as his changes in behaviour, that the fraud was found.
“We are confident that this was an isolated incident by a man with a serious problem. He stole public money, which could have been used to pay for essential services and we want to reassure the public that the money will be recuperated in full, and we have new systems in place to prevent this from happening in the future. We have a zero tolerance approach to fraud and all of our staff are aware of this.”
A Proceeds of Crime hearing will take place at a later date to determine how much Doig will have to repay.
