Furious bank customers suffered ‘phantom withdrawa

Furious bank customers suffered ‘phantom withdrawals’
from their accounts over a three year period because a corrupt
postman was stealing their cards and PIN numbers.

And their cash – totalling pds stlng 25,000 – went on a
jet-setting international gambling spree, a court was told
today (Friday).

But self-confessed gambling addict Ian Jones, 28,
escaped a jail term because his wife is disabled.

He had jetted to Las Vegas for all-night black jack
and roulette games and enjoyed luxury cruises in the Bahamas
with his ill-gotten money.

He also used the money to refurbish the kitchen in his
home and spoil his disabled wife with gifts and holidays.

Meanwhile, the frustrated victims were having to replace
the missing cash from their NatWest bank accounts.

Three years between June, 1989, and June, 1992, passed before
the Post Office Investigation Department, NatWest bank and the irate
victims caught Jones.

In that time, the delivery postman had stolen 100 cards and
their accompanying confidential PIN numbers from the New Cross,
SE London, post office.

Cash withdrawals totalled pds stlng 25,000 by the time he was
stopped.

Once questioned he immediately admitted his crime and promised
to pay back the losers.

Inner London Crown Court heard that he had repaid pds stlng
18,600 so far.

Judge Leo Charles QC ordered Jones, of King Arthur Close,
Peckham, SE London, to pay the remaining pds stlng 6,400 within
a month.

Jones admitted nine specimen charges of theft.

The judge said he would normally have received ‘a hefty,
well-deserved immediate prison term.

‘
But he suspended his two-year jail sentence for two years
because his wife was disabled and dependent on him.

The woman, who was in the public gallery, wears callipers
and uses two crutches.

‘You can thank your wife for your freedom today,’ the
judge said.

Jones, he said, had betrayed the trust placed in him by his
employer and by the community.

‘You stole property in the custody of the Post Office and your
selection of what to steal was careful,’ he said.

‘That was a dreadful performance.

‘You repeated this crime over a period of nearly three years
time and time again.

‘The fact that you were a gambler is no defence.

You were
excited by gambling and you carried on this course of crime to
maintain that excitement.

‘
Jones also was placed under a supervision order to ‘wean him
from the curse of gambling.

‘
When walking free out of the court room, Jones, surrounded by
his wife and family, clenched his fist and grinned in jubilation.

ENDS
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