The court has postponed for one week, the sentencing date for embezzlement convict Janice Samuel, who was initially scheduled to be punished yesterday.
Justice Iain Morley, who had a packed slate yesterday, rescheduled the hearing to August 1 to address a newly raised issue.
Earlier this month, the media personality admitted stealing several thousand dollars from her former boss – some three years after being charged.
Samuel threw in the towel in the High Court after her employer, Shirmique Jeffers, managing operator of Connies Comfort Suites, testified at the trial about how Samuel stole the money, when, and her reaction when confronted.
The convict was employed by Jeffers as a consultant at the apartment rental business for just two weeks when she stole the money between February 1 and 6, 2016.
She was responsible for administrative work and collecting rent from tenants for which she prepared receipts. The convict was required to place in a drop box any cash she collected, but failed to do so.
The evidence was that she deliberately recorded inaccurate records of what was received, and the employer discovered this when she compared what was documented in Samuel’s handwriting with the carbon copies of the receipts in the receipt books which were also in Samuel’s handwriting.
After going back and forth with Samuel over the missing money, Jeffers reported the matter to the police who learned she has deposited several thousand dollars on an apartment, a new stove, a queen size bed frame and a mattress. The arrangement was for her to pay monthly instalments on the furnishings. Additionally, the same week of the theft, she rented a car, paying $850 for eight days.
But when confronted about everything, she said the monies used to make those payments were from her personal funds and she had not stolen anything from her boss.
She blamed the system at the workplace, saying the cash was misplaced because, according to her, there were no fixed procedures as to how cash should be dealt with in the office and she used her own initiative to deal with it.