Five-digit theft, zero-second jail term

A Dunedin woman has avoided a prison sentence for systematically stealing almost NZ$23,000 from her employer over a 10-month period. Sandra Joy Kennedy was, until March this year, an accounts assistant at Dunedin-based PS Marketing South Island Ltd. Between May 2013 and March 17, she cashed 44 company cheques without authority, in the process fabricating letters from customers about returning products and asking for refunds. By this method, she stole just under $23,000 from her employer, going as far as accessing the company's computer accounting system to change spreadsheets to hide what she had done. Anomalies were noticed in the system in March and inquiries led to Kennedy being arrested and charged. She pleaded guilty in the Dunedin District Court in August to charges of causing a $22,978 loss to PS Marketing by deception and directly accessing the company's computer accounting system, thereby causing a loss. Naturally, the company owner was devastated by what Kennedy had done and the huge breach of trust involved, and the victim was upset the defendant had lied and other employees had been placed under suspicion. A second person in the company was upset, not only about the actual loss, but about the amount of time spent trying to work out what had happened. That victim expressed disbelief and anger about what Kennedy had done and sorrow for the other employees who had been lied to. The aggravating factors in this are the premeditation and reasonably lengthy time involved, the significant amount stolen with little prospect of repayment, the substantial breach of trust, and the effect on the owners of the business, not to mention Kennedy's previous convictions for dishonesty. Even with all that in mind, she was lucky to avoid jail time. Instead, Kennedy was sentenced to concurrent terms of six months' home detention with special conditions, 200 hours' community work, and reparation of $22,978. And you wonder why crime is such a problem all over the world.