A woman is in court for charges of theft and fraud after allegedly issuing fake loans and pocketing the cash amounting to $36,000 while working at a payday advance business in Kelowna.
Melanie Robertson sat in Kelowna court for the second day of what is scheduled to be a 10-day trial in the B.C. Supreme Court for charges of theft and fraud over $5,000.
The charges are considered to be indictable offences, meaning that they are considered to be severe and carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.
Allison Krete, the former bookkeeper and director of Easy Cash took the stand in court as a witness on May 7.
Her husband, J. Krete and Daljit Sadhra co-owned the business cash advance business with locations in Kelowna and Kamloops. Both locations are now closed.
While on the stand, Krete said she became aware of the alleged fraud in October 2019 after receiving a phone call from Consumer Protection B.C., with a complaint from an Easy Cash client who claimed that “inappropriate withdrawals” were being taken from their account.
Immediately, Krete said she and her husband began looking through the company’s documents to figure out what had happened.
“We found the contract, but the signatures did not match,” said Krete.
She told the court that this is when she began to figure out that Robertson had been issuing fraudulent loans.
“You know when you open up a can of worms?” Asked Krete. “That’s what happened.”
Krete alleges that Robertson was secretly issuing fraudulent cash loans to existing clients. She explained that Robertson was then taking money out of the float safe in the store and was keeping the cash for herself.
The alleged fraud did not raise red flags initially because the account sheets were balanced at the end of the day, said Krete.
“There were no accounting red flags,” said Krete.
After the first complaint from a customer, Krete said the phone started ringing constantly.
Sadhra, a co-owner of the business, also took the stand as a witness on the afternoon of May 7. He alleges that he became aware of the fraudulent activity after receiving phone calls from angry clients who were upset after having money inappropriately withdrawn from their bank accounts, despite not having an existing loan with the payday advance business.
He said that in addition to issuing fraudulent loans, Robertson was also increasing the maximum loan limit available to clients in order to take more money.
Sadhra explained to the court that when a person defaults on a payment, Easy Cash was authorized to “sweep” their bank account of funds. However, in this case, the client was not defaulting on payments, as a loan had been inappropriately taken out in their name.
He said that all funds taken from clients as a result of the fraud were returned in full.
Both Krete and Sadhra allege that only Robertson could have been able to issue the fraudulent loans as she was the only employee in the store at the time of the alleged incidents.
Robertson’s employee login is also reported to be digitally connected to the loan entries.
The 10-day trial will continue Wednesday and into next week.
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