KEY POINTS:
A former Turners accountant who stole nearly $3 million of the company's money to finance his gambling habit has been jailed for four and a half years.
Christopher Sue was sentenced in the Auckland District Court this week to four years and six months jail after pleading guilty to three fraud-related charges.
Sue, who is in his mid-30s, had worked for Turners Auctions in various accounting roles between June 1997 and May 2005 before filling in for the finance manager while she was on maternity leave.
He used his position to channel company cash into his own account for most of this time, and it was only when the finance manager returned from leave in 2006 that he was caught.
Investigators found that he had used false accounting entries to take $2.8 million from Turners between 1999 and 2006.
He also obtained another $121,786 by taking secret commissions on purchases from a Singapore firm supplying secondhand vehicles to Turners.
Serious Fraud Office director Grant Liddell said most of the money was used to pay for Sue's gambling.
He had a loyalty card at Auckland's Sky City casino and was a frequent visitor to the VIP gambling areas there. He also occasionally gambled at casinos in Christchurch, Hamilton and Australia and had a gambling account with the TAB.
After being caught Sue repaid $280,500 of the money he had taken, and the company says it has written off the rest as a loss.
GUILTY
* The charges and sentences:
* False accounting by an employee - four years
* False accounting - four and a half years
* Conspiracy to defraud - four years
* The sentences are to be served concurrently.
