Fraud

The Brief

It was suspected that the company secretary at a large multi-departmental construction company may be processing cheques fraudulently and making payments into their own personal account. It was reported by several customers that they had been requested to 'leave the payee section blank' on their cheques because the suspect 'didn't know which department it needed to be paid to yet'.

The Findings

An initial examination revealed that some of the cheques paid into the suspect's personal account corresponded to cheque numbers previously removed from the cheque book.

A comparison of the handwriting on the cheques belonging to customers was made against the specimen handwriting. Strong support was found for the suspect having completed the payee sections on each of these cheques.

Further examinations of the cheque stubs remaining in the chequebook were carried out. It was determined, through the use of various lighting techniques, that many of the stubs had been altered via various methods. Some entries had been physically abraded, others written with an 'erasable' pen, and others simply overwritten or crossed out.