'Appallingly dishonest' ex-lorry driver spared jail after scamming his firm out of £12,000
A former Telford lorry driver has been spared jail after defrauding the haulage firm he had worked for out of £12,500 by filling up his personal car on his company fuel card.
Michael Herbert, 49, who now lives in Gloucester, was working for Lanes Group PLC as an HGV driver at the time of the offences between November 2018 and June 2019, Shrewsbury Crown Court heard on Friday.
Prosecutor Sally Hancox said Herbert was given the fuel card to fill up his work's truck.
She told the court that in December 2019, one of the firm's managers noticed an "abnormality" on the fuel card bills.
"Mr Herbert's bill was showing more transactions than he could possibly use," she said.
Following an internal investigation, she said "suspicious transactions" were discovered to have taken place at Trench Lock and elsewhere in Telford.
Police later identified a Vauxhall Touran being used with the fuel card and officers located the vehicle at Herbert's address in Ford Road, Newport.
The court was told that Herbert, who had pleaded guilty to one count of defrauding his former firm out of £12,500 at an earlier hearing, had 19 previous convictions for 69 offences, including multiple counts of dishonesty and fraud against previous employers.
However Robert Edwards, mitigating for Herbert, told the court that since the time of the latest offence, he had become the sole carer to his adult son, who had special needs.
Judge Anthony Lowe told the defendant: "Make no bones about it - quite frankly, I should be sentencing you to prison. You have an appalling record for dishonesty.
"Anybody who steals from their employer ordinarily should expect to go to prison, and those who do it again undoubtedly do go to prison."
But he conceded the offences did occur five years ago and that the delays in bringing the case to court had not been the fault of the defendant.
He added: "And if I were to send you to prison, the progress made with him [your son] would be undone."
He handed Herbert a 24-month prison sentence but suspended it for two years. He also ordered him to complete 200 hours of unpaid work and pay back his former firm £100 a month.