The one with the
employee that faked fainting when fraud was discovered

Advice was provided to a nationally recognised architects practice in relation to the dishonest conduct of a senior operations and HR manager. It was alleged that the employee had been diverting money from the client’s business operations under the guise of costs for training, which was an accounting entry cover up to hide fraudulent conduct.  When the issue was raised in a management meeting, the employee (who was not yet suspected) fainted. 

After initial investigation steps, the client was advised to immediately seek both a freezing injunction to protect against dissipation by the employee and non-party disclosure application to obtain the bank account statements of the employee.  These applications were successful. 

The application for disclosure directing banks to disclose to the client the bank account records of the employee including statements, specifically statements and copy cheques enabled the client to understand how long the dishonest conduct had been taking place, for what purpose and the value.

The disclosure revealed a lavish lifestyle of spending of almost half a million pounds over the course of four years, all diverted from the architects’ practice. 

The employee was dismissed for gross misconduct but in this case, limited recovery was possible as the stolen monies had all been spent on lifestyle such as lavish holidays.