An accountant has received a five-year prison sentence from Newport Crown Court after stealing more than £2.4 million from a group of family companies to fund her gambling addiction.
Jemma Lewis of Wolverhampton, 40, pleaded guilty to five counts of fraud by abuse of position after it was discovered that she had received payments of more than £2.4 million over and above her normal salary and legitimate expenses from 2018 to 2013.
Prosecutor Alex Orndal revealed at least £1.4 million of those funds had been sent to online betting companies though this was to the bigger brands in the industry.
Orndal said identifying other operators would prove more difficult.
Fraud Affected Five Family Companies
Lewis, who earned £200,000 in salary, committed fraud against five companies within the same group owned by James Davies.
Those affected include Daisy Vale Limited, Charnwood Accounts, Edward Davies Construction and Fastnet Properties Ltd.
She first worked as a receptionist for Davies in 2007 and he funded her training to become accountant for the family businesses in 2017.
It was subsequently discovered that from 2018 to 2023 the total payments to her account exceeded £3.6 million.
After deducting her salary and other legitimate payments, there was an excess of £2.4 million unaccounted for.
At least £1.4 million Spent On Gambling
It transpired that in addition to at least £1.4 million going to gambling companies, Lewis had spent £67,000 on crypto currencies, which can also be used for crypto betting sites that don’t require ID verification, and £9,000 on FairFX, a company that provides financial services focused on currency exchange and international payments.
Lewis had enjoyed luxury holidays too as records showed she had spent £3,600 on lastminute.com, £1,000 on P&O cruises and another £1,000 on Jet2Holidays.
Company owner Davies said that he had treated Lewis “like a daughter” but that her actions had “affected the lives of countless people” including one member of staff who had been unable to withdraw her pension due to lack of funds under Lewis’s stewardship.
Former director Mark Cotter provided a victim impact statement saying he had to take several weeks off work due to stress.
“I felt forced to leave the company that I had spent a lot of my life trying to build,” he said.
“I’m in disbelief that all of this happened because of Jemma Lewis.”
Speaking on behalf of the defendant, Neil Corre stated that his client’s gambling addiction had been the root cause of her actions.
Lewis wasn’t gambling to win, he explained, she had a compulsion to continue gambling but she had been free of her addiction for a year.
“She has lost her job, her home and she may lose her liberty, but her moral compass has been restored,” he said.
Jim Munro is a betting industry and gambling expert who has been a national newspaper journalist for over 30 years, predominantly at The Sunday Times and The Sun, where he wrote a weekly soccer betting column. Jim also worked on the launch of Virgin Bet with Gamesys and was subsequently head of editorial at LiveScore, the sports media and betting group.
