A provincial court cashier, accused of pilfering thousands of dollars in court-ordered payments, has been acquitted by a judge who slammed the court’s payment system as outdated.
Provincial court Judge Rachel Rusen found the Winnipeg court counter cashier not guilty of one count each of fraud over $5,000 and theft over $5,000, in a written decision last week.
The allegations stem from what appeared to be a missing $16,000 over 16 payments from 2018 to 2020, but Rusen said she wasn’t convinced money had definitively gone missing.
Court counter cashiers are responsible for taking court payments, filling out documents, issuing receipts and balancing the payments.
“I am firmly of the opinion that the payment system at the provincial court counter was at all material times archaic and problematic. I find that the evidence before the court is significantly lacking to convince me that (the accused) had any hand in these allegations or that funds are even missing,” said Rusen.
“I am convinced that the reliability of the investigation itself is flawed.”
A revenue manager at the 408 York Ave. court house began auditing fine cards, after a Supreme Court of Canada decision in 2018 deemed mandatory victim surcharges unconstitutional.
She discovered a discrepancy on a fine card that indicated a cash payment of $1,800 had been received at the counter in June 2019, but the cash could not be located.
The cashiers who had worked that day did not appear to record the payment, but the initials of the accused were on the receipt that was issued to the person who paid the fine.
A further audit by a revenue policy analyst for the province found 178 incidents in which the accused was working and cash was not properly documented or found, but the Crown abandoned all but 16 of those incidents over the trial, Rusen said.
No police or forensic investigation was completed, but the policy analyst’s conclusion was that the accused had intentionally completed misleading paperwork and took cash over many incidents, said Rusen.
Rusen said the record-keeping process was inaccurate.
Evidence at trial indicated receipts had been assigned to other cashiers, were used out of order, and payments had been accepted but not always recorded.
“The evidence establishes that many documents are unsigned and that what is written in a fine card can be wrong,” said Rusen.
erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca
Erik Pindera
Reporter
Erik Pindera is a reporter for the Free Press, mostly focusing on crime and justice. The born-and-bred Winnipegger attended Red River College Polytechnic, wrote for the community newspaper in Kenora, Ont. and reported on television and radio in Winnipeg before joining the Free Press in 2020. Read more about Erik.
Every piece of reporting Erik produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.