A fraudster has been ordered to repay £380,000 to the Surrey school she swindled. Debra Poole abused her position as school business manager for Hinchley Wood Primary School, in Esher, to take more than half a million pounds for herself.
Poole was in charge of the school bank accounts as well as the finances for Woody’s, the school’s breakfast club, and its after-school clubs. She was jailed after police found she transferred funds, writing out cheques to herself and cashing them – stealing over £490k between October 14, 2011 and October 10, 2018.
She also used her position to alter her own pay. In February 2009, Poole submitted a variation in pay form to Surrey County Council’s payroll team, which increased her pay scale from level E to level F. Two years later, in November 2011, she submitted another form which saw her pay increase from level SP9 to SP10. Council documents show that in 2011 an SP9 minimum salary was £32,169 per year, while an SP10 salary was £36,615.
She was also in charge of managing the invoices and finances for Woody’s, the school’s breakfast and after school clubs, and claimed that between June 2016 and September 2018 she was working 30 hours a week as their administrator.
In April 2023 Poole was sentenced to six and a half years in prison. She was found guilty of one count of fraud by abuse of position and three counts of fraud by false representation following a trial at Kingston Crown Court in March 2023.
A confiscation hearing at Kingston Crown Court this week was told that the total benefit from Poole’s criminality was £535,770.82. An uplift to cover inflation was applied to this figure, giving a total benefit figure of £708,267.02.
The court agreed that the available amount Poole had access to, and therefore should pay, was £380,884.28, including the sale of her house. If she does not pay the money within three months, she will either have to apply to extend the deadline or serve a default prison sentence of three years and eight months.
If the default sentenced is invoked, Poole would still need to pay the confiscation order.
Fraudster used school cash for ‘extravagant lifestyle’
Hinchley Wood Primary School, in Esher
Detective Inspector Charley Bryant from the Economic Crime Unit, said: “The outcome following the confiscation hearing today demonstrates that we will go after people who have benefited from the proceeds of crime and ensure that they do not continue to do so.
“Debra Poole stole hundreds of thousands of pounds from Hinchley Wood Primary School while she was employed there as business manager. This gross breach of trust and her elaborate deception spanning some nine years funded an extravagant lifestyle and afforded her luxury holidays and cars which she would not otherwise have been able to afford.
“I have no doubt that this would have continued had the school not worked out what was going on and reported the matter to police, resulting in a lengthy and complex investigation which included examining bank accounts and hundreds of documents to prove that she had defrauded the school.
“The fact that we have pursued this to a confiscation hearing should also be a deterrent to anyone else thinking of committing similar offences that it is simply not worth the risk – not only could you end up in prison, you could also have everything taken away from you as well.”