The former employee of an agricultural firm in La Guancha, Tenerife, has been sentenced by the Supreme Court (TS) to three and a half years in prison and ordered to repay 365,000 euros, reflecting the funds unlawfully obtained through falsified payroll records.
The defendant, who was previously convicted in 2016 for a fraud offence and sentenced to three months in prison, which was commuted to a fine of 720 euros, served as an administrative assistant for the aforementioned entity from 2003 until 2017.
Among his responsibilities was the preparation of payroll for all employees, and he had installed a software programme that only he could access. Each month, he produced a list of transactions for salary payments in both paper and electronic formats via a pen drive.
The printed version was handed over to the accountant, who signed it and provided it to the person responsible for presenting it at the bank to carry out the payroll transactions.
Exploiting this system, “with the clear intention of acquiring an illicit benefit, he took advantage of the fact that only the paper document was reviewed, while the individual amounts were not compared with the total, nor was the electronic copy examined.”
The bank merely confirmed that the total across the two formats matched and generated two distinct lists of transactions; one containing the accurate payroll sum, and the other reflecting the inflated amount which was found on the pen drive.
Consequently, between 2009 and 2017, the accused secured a financial benefit from the company estimated at nearly 365,000 euros. Upon discovering this discrepancy, the company sought legal redress, where he was acquitted of misappropriation but found guilty of the prolonged fraud, a ruling now upheld by the TS.
The defence argued that the case arose following a labour dispute after the individual was dismissed in 2017. They contended that the matter primarily revolved around employment issues or the resolution of outstanding payments, which should not have resulted in criminal charges they viewed as typical of civil matters.
He asserted that the amounts received were as agreed with the firm, as he had taken on greater responsibilities, resulting in a salary increase to 34,000 euros per year, and that 66,601 euros was a refund from the Tax Agency that he had advanced on behalf of the company.
The Supreme Court dismissed the claim that the employee accepted payments for years that he was not entitled to, indicating that these actions were to conceal the crime, and he suggested he had personally covered 45,000 euros in costs.
Additionally, it was noted that no one else in the company earned a wage comparable to his; not even the manager, who earned 82,000 euros in 2016, while the salaries of administrative staff remained fixed, with only those of agricultural workers varying.
