Former accounts secretary sentenced to seven years for defrauding Stellenbosch law firm of R13 million
Alwena Smith, a former senior accounts secretary, has been sentenced to seven years of direct imprisonment for orchestrating a complex fraud scheme that defrauded a Stellenbosch law firm of over R13 million.
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A former accounts secretary who defrauded a Stellenbosch law firm of more than R13 million has been sentenced to an effective seven years’ direct imprisonment by the Bellville Commercial Crimes Court.
Alwena Smith, 53, entered into a plea and sentencing agreement with the State and was convicted on 171 counts of fraud, 171 counts of interference with data, and four counts of money laundering.
The court sentenced Smith to 12 years’ direct imprisonment for the fraud counts, together with five years suspended for five years on condition that she is not convicted of fraud, theft or corruption during the period of suspension.
She was further sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment for the interference with data charges, wholly suspended for five years, on condition that she is not convicted of a similar offence.
For the four counts of money laundering, the court imposed 12 years’ imprisonment, wholly suspended for five years on condition that she is not convicted of money laundering under the Prevention of Organised Crime Act during the suspension period.
The sentences were ordered to run concurrently, resulting in an effective seven-year prison term. Smith was also declared unfit to possess a firearm.
According to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), Smith worked as a senior accounts secretary at the law firm from March 2006 until she was dismissed in May 2018.
Her duties included managing daily income and expenditure, receipting client payments and conducting banking transactions on the firm’s trust account.
Clients paid retainers or funds into the law firm’s trust account, from which payments would be deducted when work was carried out on their files.
Smith had access to the firm’s electronic banking system and client files and was responsible for making electronic payments to creditors and debtors.
Investigations revealed that she used her own internet profile and that of a colleague to create fictitious beneficiaries, enabling her to transfer funds from the trust account into her personal bank account.
Authorities found that 171 transfers were made, while investigators also identified 171 illegal cheque withdrawals linked to client files she had access to.
The investigation established that R13,267,096.59 was stolen between January 2016 and April 2 2018.
To conceal the transactions, Smith created false beneficiaries with slight spelling variations of existing clients, preventing the law firm’s banking system from detecting duplicates.
She also repaid about R6.5 million to the firm’s trust account as part of attempts to conceal the fraud.
Before carrying out the scheme, Smith had registered a company, Garda TeK (Pty) Ltd, of which she was the sole director. Some of the stolen funds were paid into the company’s bank accounts.
Other payments were made into the bank accounts of her husband and daughter, whom she allegedly misled into believing the money came from an inheritance. Both were cleared of wrongdoing after Smith admitted they were unaware of her fraudulent activities.
NPA spokesperson Eric Ntabazalila said: “The NPA welcomes the sentence.”