Hotel payroll manager found guilty of embezzlement

A payroll manager at a landmark Edinburgh hotel has been jailed for two years after she created a series of fictitious employees in order to steal more than £100,000 from her employer.

Janet Davis, 48, from West Lothian had pleaded guilty to embezzling the Hilton owned Caledonian Hotel at an earlier hearing.

At the sentencing hearing before Edinburgh Sheriff Court this week, details were given of how Davis had registered 10 made-up employees and paid their wages into two of her own bank accounts over four and a half years. 

The court heard she falsified paperwork, forged signatures and invented time sheets.

In mitigation, it was said she stole the money to pay off debts after her husband was made redundant.

But in sentencing Davis, Sheriff Andrew Lothian told her: "This is a very large sum of money taken by you in an elaborate, careful and deceitful scheme. 

“There is no question you should go to prison. It would have been for three years but for your co-operation."

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By Andrew Smith

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