The Defendant and Mr Allo had agreed that she would look after Mrs Allo’s finances until Mr Allo, who lived in Spain, could visit Jersey to transfer the financial side to him.

The Defendant had sole access to Mrs Allo’s bank accounts from 28 May 2021 until 20 October 2021. In August 2021, Mr Allo informed the Defendant that he would be visiting the Island in October. The Defendant told her father that she had taken approximately £8,000 from her grandmother’s bank account. She said that she would pay the money back. Mr Allo advised her that the bank accounts would be audited and that she should seek legal advice or speak to the Judicial Greffier.

In October 2021, Mr Allo returned to the Island and informed the Judicial Greffier of the Defendant’s actions. Mr Allo informed the Defendant that he had done so and the Defendant wrote to the Judicial Greffier and was removed as delegate.

The Defendant stole £16,251.29 from her grandmother over a 5-month period. She used the money to fund her lifestyle, including a shopping trip to Liverpool, various activities, including a boating trip, meals out, groceries, takeaways and other general expenses.

The Defendant had been appointed by the Court to act in her grandmother’s best interests. She breached the trust placed in her by her family and the Court.

Details of Mitigation:

Guilty plea, previous good character and repayment of £7,225.

Previous Convictions:

The Defendant has no previous convictions.

Conclusions:

Count 1:

2 years’ imprisonment.

Compensation Order sought in the sum of £9,026.29 with a default sentence of 6 months’ imprisonment.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

Count 1:

18 months’ imprisonment, suspended for 2 years.

Compensation order made in the sum of £9,026.29 to be paid at £250 per month within 3 years of today with 6 months’ imprisonment in default of payment.

A. M. Harrison Esq., Crown Advocate.

Advocate D. S. Steenson for the Defendant.

JUDGMENT

THE DEPUTY BAILIFF:

1. Carla Allo, you are 43 years old and fall to be sentenced for stealing just over £16,000 from your Grandmother whilst you were a court appointed delegate. You were appointed as a delegate by the Royal Court when your Grandmother was 83 years old, jointly with your father from whom you concealed your dishonesty when committing this offence. You were sworn in as a delegate in May 2021 and had sole access to your Grandmother’s bank accounts between then and October 20^th of that year. When you told your father that you had stolen money from your Grandmother he was unsurprisingly shocked and you were removed as delegate when your dishonesty was reported to the Court.

2. As we have said, you stole over £16,000 and you spent the money on yourself and your family, leisure activities, food and the like as particularised by the Crown this morning in its opening. You have repaid over £7,000 of that sum which is to your credit.

3. On any view this was a gross breach of trust and indeed in our judgment callous and selfish exploitation of a position of trust.

4. The policy of the Courts in relation to such matters is clear. Such offences are punished by custodial sentences in all but the most exceptional circumstances and that has been the policy of the Jersey Courts for decades, and as Whelan on Sentence makes clear at paragraph 343.

“In the search for exceptional circumstances the Courts have repeatedly held that matters often advanced amount to mitigation but do not outweigh the need for prison sentences to deter this sort of offending and some such matters identified in previous cases are good character, cooperation following detection, remorse, injury to family life.”

5. Such matters may amount to mitigation circumstances but they do not, on the previous cases amount to exceptional ones, and as the Superior Number said in the case of Kirkland v AG 2001/200

“It is one of the tragedies of cases like this that there is almost invariably very powerful mitigation.”

6. We have considered the case of AG v Marsh 2002/22, referred to at paragraph 478 of Whelan, where a bank employee stole money and was sentenced to a term of imprisonment. In respect of exceptional circumstances, the Court said this is Marsh :-

“The cases seem invariably to involve offenders of excellent previous character, who co-operate fully with the police, who employ a not especially sophisticated modus operandi, who intend to make restoration (and sometimes do so wholly or in part), who plead guilty, who evince a more or less inadequate personality, either generally or in response to the configuration of problems which have led to the offence, who have lost employment, professional status and prospects as a result of the offence, who have suffered severe damage to family life, suffered genuine remorse and, who as often as not, suffer in some particular personal way that makes a genuine emotional appeal. Unsurprisingly, the Courts have felt unable to treat these circumstances as exceptional; they are, in the context of the cases, in fact commonplace.”

The Court went on to say:-

“We have, however, in the public interest to make it clear to others in positions of trust throughout the community that if they break that trust and steal from their employers imprisonment will almost certainly follow.”

7. The same principles apply to the dishonesty of which you have been convicted.

8. Accordingly we do not find and cannot find exceptional circumstances. A custodial sentence in this case is warranted and a sentence of 18 months’ imprisonment, is warranted by your conduct. Nonetheless, by the finest of margins the Jurats have decided to suspend that sentence for a period of 2 years, and the Court does that for three principal reasons:-

(i) To ensure that you remain in employment so as to repay the balance owing to your victim.

(ii) To reflect the particular family and personal circumstances about which we have read in the many references and letters supplied to the Court, which led you to abandon your usual high standards for the period of this offending, and

(iii) In the very particular circumstances of this case, we do not regard immediate custody as being in the public interest although - as we have said - a sentence of custody, albeit suspended, is certainly appropriate to mark the seriousness of this offence.

9. We order you to pay the compensation figure notified to us by the Crown, and we order you to continue repaying the compensation due at the rate of £250 per month (as you are currently paying); the total sum to be repaid within 3 years of today.

10. You must understand that the effect of the suspended sentence of imprisonment that the Court has imposed is that if you commit any further offence during the currency of this suspension of the sentence, namely 2 years, then you will be liable to be sentenced as warranted by that further offence and on top you will be required to serve an additional 18 months, do you understand? We set a term of imprisonment of 6 months’ in default of non-payment of the outstanding compensation.

Authorities

Whelan on Aspects of Sentencing in the Superior Court of Jersey.

Kirkland v AG 2001/200.

AG v Marsh 2002/22.

AG v Bellas and Louis [2022] JRC 198

AG v Bellas and Louis [2023] JRC 086

AG v Harrigan [2021] JRC 288

AG v Manning [2021] JRC 172

AG v Callec [2018] JRC 056

AG v Turner [2012] JRC 147

AG v Oliveira [2012] JRC 018

AG v Hay [1995] JRC 133