Post Office boss nicked £300k to ‘buy love’

A Post Office director who stole over £300,000 from the Royal Mail because he was wanted to try and ‘buy love’ has been sentenced to nearly two years in prison.

Paul Swanton, 52, stole the massive sums to impress women and splash the cash on luxury foreign holidays with girlfriends, Southwark Crown Court heard.

The postie, who joined the service in 1986 as a clerk, used his position as a director to steal £261,875 worth of postal orders from the firm, depositing them in his bank account or exchanging them for cash.

The court heard how Swanton rose the company ranks to become communications delivery director and head of his own department, answering to the board of directors.

He also took £74,000 in Virgin vouchers, which he spent on six separate foreign holidays – with another already booked when he was discovered.

Prosecutor Richard Barraclough QC said: ‘Mr Swanton joined the Post Office on 6 January 1986 as a counter clerk at the Bolton Crown office.

‘By the 1 September 2016, he was the communications delivery director. In that post his duties included responsibility for the communications team.

‘His remuneration in 2016 was £63,000 per year, increasing to £86,000 in 2017.’

The prosecutor told how on 28 February 2018, a fraud investigator at City Bank contacted the Post Office over concerns that Swanton’s account was being used for money laundering.

‘The first deposit of £240 was made in 2006. Mr Swanton was also authorised to obtain Virgin gift cards for marketing and promotional services.’

The court heard how Swanton had already spent around £50,000 worth of the vouchers when yet more, unredeemed gift cards were found in office drawers.

‘Mr Swanton’s Post Office locker was searched on 15 March 2018 and a further £24,000 worth of cards were discovered before they had been used.

‘He used the gift cards for six separate holidays. A final holiday he had booked was cancelled by him when his fraudulent activity was discovered.

‘On the 18 March 2018, some three days after his formal suspension, the Post Office received a letter from Mr Swanton.

‘He said he was writing to accept his guilt.’

Judge Michael Grieve QC read from the letter Swanton sent to his former employees, in which he admitted to stealing so he could ‘buy love and affection.’

‘There are two parts of my personality,’ he explained, ‘my public one, working hard.’

‘The second is a private one, driven by despair action and addiction.

‘I have lost absolutely everything I spent my adult life building. I am a very frightened man.’

The court heard how Swanton was interviewed by financial investigators on 23 March last year.

‘He explained that he had been misusing postal orders for about ten years and Virgin gift cards for about three years.

Mr Barraclough continued: ‘He said that his behaviour resulted from the stress of commuting between London and Birmingham.

‘He said he used the money to clear his overdraft, buy clothing, fund relationships, visit nightclubs and fund – as he put it – his addiction to spending.

‘He said that he paid the postal orders into his City Bank account, sometimes directly, sometimes through a Lloyds bank account.

‘He exchanged some of the postal orders for cash at Post Office branches.’

Mr Barraclough explained that the total amount lost, including the Virgin gift cards and printing costs, totaling £348,819.47.

The prosecutor told how a single postal orders are limited to £250 in value – Swanton ordered so many that he cost the Post Office over £12,000 in printing fees alone.

‘He is a director who sits just bellow board level. I suppose the Americans might describe him as a Vice President.

‘He had enormous discretion, which is why he decision making process was not questioned.

‘It is simply the abuse of power.’

Defence counsel Toby Long said ‘He is before you a 52-year-old man in a wretched state from a fall from grace caused entirely by his own actions.’

Mr Long told explained that Swanton would repay the full amount using his pension: ‘There are sufficient funds. It will be a miserable fund – there won’t be much left.’

The court heard how Swanton has been forced to sell a property in Bolton as well as his home in Birmingham and has been sleeping in a friend’s living room for the last few months.

‘Ever since it was discovered, Mr Swanton sought to behave as well as he could given his offending. He fell on his sword within three days.

‘He was alone, he didn’t have a partner and, he would say, he had to spend money to not be lonely.’

Mr Long described the relationships, saying: ‘It was not in pursuit of sexual relations, he thinks there was some exploitation.

‘It was largely delusional.’

Judge Michael Grieve QC said: ‘Paul Swanton, you are aged 52 and today you have pleaded guilty to 16 counts of fraud by abuse of trust.

‘You worked for the Post Office for 20 years. You were able to commit these offences because of the trust that was put in you.’

The judge explained that the main motivation for the crimes was: ‘largely for the purpose of pursuing relationships with women.’

Swanton has thus far felt unable to tell his elderly parents about his offending, both of whom are now in their 90s.

‘You have not been able to tell them about your predicament and your catastrophic fall from grace.’

The judge concluded: ‘You were in the grip of something akin to an addiction arising out of your personality and your lonely personal circumstances.’

Swanton, of Furzton, Milton Keynes, pleaded guilty to 16 counts of fraud by abuse of position committed between January 2007 to March 2018.

He was handed 20 months behind bars on each of the counts, to run concurrently.

The judge also ordered that he repay a total of £379,613.47 to cover the loss and prosecution costs.

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Mr Paul Andrew SWANTON (3/11/66)
4 Selworthy, Furzton, Milton Keynes, MK4 1HA

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