Paris Markham, 22, accepted 22 slips on £90 to £95 tricast bets which each made between £5,000 and £100,000, jurors heard
A crooked Ladbrokes cashier paid out more than £1million in three hours to a crime gang by recording ineligible betting slips on horse races as winners, a court has heard.
Paris Markham, 22, accepted 22 slips on £90 to £95 tricast bets which each made between £5,000 and £100,000 at the betting shop in Edmonton, London, jurors heard.
She was part of a conspiracy with ex-boyfriend Aurica Vaduva, 23, and Daniel Constantin, 28, which enabled the scammers to blow a fortune on luxury goods, the court was told.
Markham admits assisting in the plot to defraud her employers but claims she was threatened by men on the street as she made her way to work.
Constantin has admitted conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering and will be sentenced at the end of the trial at Wood Green Crown Court.
Corinne Bramwell, prosecuting, said an organised criminal gang worked together to ‘defraud a betting company out of just over £1million, during the course of a few hours on June 30, 2019.’
She said the group had also worked together on ‘their subsequent efforts to conceal, convert or disguise the proceeds of that conspiracy.
‘Over the course of approximately three hours, between 2pm and 5pm, customer services manager Paris Markham, fraudulently paid out a series of 22 winning bets to the total value of just over a million pounds to the OCG members who posed as customers.
‘In reality the monies that were obtained were transferred into the bank accounts of these defendants.
‘The money was moved in this way in order to gain access and use of those stolen monies by the organised crime group.
‘It was moved in credit transactions, cash withdrawals, foreign currency purchases and purchases of high value goods such as luxury motor vehicles, either on the same day of the fraud or the day after.
‘The Crown’s case is that each defendant undertook a specific different role.
‘The Crown suggests Ms Markham took a pivotal role in the frauds, she was an employee at Ladbrokes and worked at the Edmonton branch, she was the inside woman.
Markham (pictured) admits assisting in the plot to defraud her employers but claims she was threatened by men on the street as she made her way to work
‘She used her position to facilitate the transaction of hundreds of thousands of pounds to the other members, without her, the fraud would not have been possible.’
‘It’s not in dispute that Ms Markham made those payments or that they were fraudulent.
‘She has pleaded not guilty because says she was behaving in the way she did because she was threatened on the street on the way to work, she asserts therefore that she was acting under duress.
‘The horse racing betting slips were handed to Ms Markham, the bets placed are known as tricast bets, on the first, second and third place of a race.
‘In this case bets placed either in sum of 90 or 95 pounds, with returns of approximately £5,000 and £100,000 for a single transaction.
‘The betting slips and therefore the actual bets placed in this fraud were deliberately illegible, if the proper procedure had been followed those betting slips would have been invalidated and in the course of policy, should not have been accepted.
‘Following the race, the slip was recorded as having been a winning bet, improperly and fraudulently, in abuse of Ms Markham’s position as an employee, she transferred the winnings to co-conspirators.
‘The prosecution case is that she was not forced and did so willingly in conjunction with her partner and father of her child.
‘Ms Markham’s role at Ladbrokes was as the inside woman, essentially stealing the money from her employer Ladbrokes, disguised as legitimate winnings.
‘Mr Vaduva is a close associate of Daniel Constantin, and significantly, at the time of the offences he was Ms Markham’s boyfriend.
‘Ms Stoica was in a relationship with Daniel’s brother and she received some of the proceeds into her Nationwide account, and transferred £20,000 to her boyfriend.
‘Count seven relates to her Metrobank account, she was unable to dissipate any of that money and therefore was in knowing possession of it.
‘Mr Radu is a friend and associate of Mr Vaduva and they worked together at the time, he received over £135,000 of the fraudulently obtained Ladbrokes money in count eight.
‘He actively concealed or transferred approximately £20,000 for his own ends in count nine.’
Vaduva is accused of possessing £139,732.80 and of laundering a further £21,000.
Markham, of Barnet, and Vaduva, of Enfield, deny conspiracy to commit fraud.
Vaduva denies further counts of conspiracy to conceal, disguise, convert or transfer criminal property; possessing criminal property; and concealing, disguising, converting or transferring criminal property.
Constantin’s brother’s girlfriend Arabela Stoica, 22, and Vaduva’s associate Somaila Radu, 29, are accused of possessing and laundering the winnings.
Stoica allegedly had two sums totalling £292,538.40 and laundered a further £173,490.
Radu allegedly had £135,556 in his account and laundered a further £20,480.
Stoica, of Leyton, denies conspiracy to conceal, disguise, convert or transfer criminal property; one count of concealing, disguise, convert or transfer criminal property; and two counts of possessing criminal property.
Radu, of Enfield, denies conspiracy to conceal, disguise, convert or transfer criminal property; one count of possessing criminal property; and one count of concealing, disguising, converting or transferring criminal property.
Constantin, of Ilford, has admitted conspiracy to defraud and will be sentenced later.
The trial continues.