Gambling addicted banker scammed 500,000 Euro from customers

A former bank employee managed to tamper with the funds of his customers and in this way scammed around 500,000 Euro. He used the money to finance his severe gambling addiction. The 31-year-old was condemned for his crime in Austria.

The defendant was accused in court that he channelled a total of 494,000 Euro from the bank accounts of customers to his own, in a period of less than one year. After he had lost the money on online gambling sites, the Austrian male turned himself in.

Gambling addiction made bank employee a criminal

The 31-year old former bank employee has tampered with the money of a total of four customer accounts. So that the customers do not realise immediately that the money is missing, he changed the frequency in which the customers receive their statements to “yearly” from the system. However shortly before the end of the year, the man realised that his fraud will now be discovered. Up to that time however he had managed to channel a total of 494,000 Euro. The fraudulent acts happened between May and September of the past year. In court he then made a comprehensive confession:

“I have been a gambling addict for several years. To satisfy my addiction, I transferred the money from the accounts of four customers to my account.”

He then used the money to finance his gambling addiction. He principally gambled the embezzled money in online sport bets. But he also gambled on other online casinos until he lost all the money. In court the father of two said, that he had won some more money at times when gambling. However a while later this money would then be completely gambled away again. 

Two year suspended sentence imposed

Lately the remorseful man from Austria was taken to court. The defence counsel of the accused, Nikolaus Rast, has requested a mild judgement, since the client had found himself in a psychological exceptional situation and had lost complete control of his gambling behaviour. The lawyer summarises the case exactly. “One does not experience such things often“. 

The wife of the accused had even reported the man as missing to the police after he did not come home for three days. Further to this, the gambling addicted man had given himself up to the police after legal advice. This has also to be taken into consideration for a reduced sentence.

The Vienna Regional Court has sentenced the former bank employee ultimately to a two year suspended sentence. The judge followed the version of the accused and in her judgement she highlighted, that the accused, had just managed to turn things. The accused had a clean police record and is currently following a therapy to get over his addiction.

The family man was finally sentenced because of breach of trust. According to Austrian Law, because of the high amount involved, this calls for a “prison sentence of up to ten years“.

In § 153 StGB it states:

“Those who use their power to access another person’s assets (…), scientifically abuse and through it diminish the assets of others, are to be condemned to a term of imprisonment up to six months or a financial penalty."

"Those who through the crime diminish the assets (…) by 300,000 Euro or over, are to be condemned to a prison sentence of between one and up to ten years.”

It is not clear, whether at least part of the money was paid back already. The affected four customers will get the money back from the bank, since in this case they are not to blame. The condemned bank employee has two new jobs in the meantime. One is part time during weekends and one is full time during the week His lawyer said: “He does not handle money in his job”.

Just some weeks ago we reported of a gambling addicted man, who defrauded several banks the sum of 130,000 Euro. In this case however, the bank customers and not the bank were victims of fraud.

Conclusion

The case in hand, shows how serious, gambling behaviour which has gone out of control, can be. The 31 year old man became a criminal, to be able to finance his gambling habits. Finally he had embezzled his employer, when nearly 500,000 Euro customer assets disappeared. He gambled the money on online casinos. Now the man who till now had a clean police record, was sentenced to two years suspended sentence in the Vienna Regional Court. The judgement is already final. He obviously does not work at the bank anymore.

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