BEGUM: POST OFFICE BOSS STOLE £18,000 IN CASH BONDS

A crooked Post Office manager who stole more than £18,000 by issuing fake cash bonds to herself is facing jail.
 
Jahira Begum, 24, repeatedly issued herself with fictitious postal orders for the maximum £250 before immediately cancelling them.

She then took advantage of the short delay before the Post Office computer system updated itself to cash the orders before they became void.

Begum now faces jail after a jury at Snaresbrook Crown Court unanimously convicted her of theft.

The judge Mr Recorder James Dawson adjourned sentencing until 30 September so that the probation service can compile a report on the defendant.

Alexandra Ward, prosecuting, said Begum started working as a member of counter staff for the Post Office in Forest Gate in 2005.

She moved to become the manager of the Porters Avenue branch in Dagenham, Essex, in 2009 and spent most of the time running the small branch on her own.

‘It was at that point that the Crown say she began to steal money from the post office system,’ Miss Ward said.

‘What Jahira Begum did whilst working at the post office was she would issue a postal order to a fictitious customer.

‘She would then cancel it, and she would use the same postal order to cash it.’

The slips, which can be bought up to the value of £250 each, are similar to pre-paid cheques which can be cashed in for the same amount at any Post Office branch.

Post Office tills are linked up to a nationwide computer system called Horizon, but it would take several minutes to update and recognise that the postal order had been cancelled.

During these ‘windows of opportunity’ Begum would cash the bond, which she placed in the till as a receipt, without marking it to indicate it had been cancelled, the court heard.

The computer would not recognise that the bond had been issued, while the cancelled bond in the till would act as a receipt for the money taken, meaning that the tills still balanced.

In this way, Begum issued herself 74 postal orders over eight months, worth a total of £18,450.

Miss Ward said: ‘All but one was to the value of £250, which was say is significant, because it was targeting the highest value of postal orders.’

Begum, of (23) Charlecroft Road, Dagenham, Essex, denied one count of theft between 14 May 2009 and 29 January 2010.

She claimed that someone else at the Post Office must have been to blame for the missing cash.
ENDS