Judge slams Whangārei Mobil station over ‘mind-blowing’ POS failures in employee theft case

Armandeep Kumar worked at a Mobil service station in Whangārei and faced fraud charges totalling more than $100,000. Photo / NZME

A judge has slammed a petrol station’s “mind-blowing” point-of-sale system after an employee was accused of stealing more than $100,000 from the business.

The man who exploited the system was convicted in relation to $1800 after investigators could not even prove he was rostered on at the time the rest went missing.

In November, former Mobil service station employee Armandeep Kumar defended three representative charges of accessing a computer for dishonest purposes in a judge-alone trial before Judge Gene Tomlinson.

The trial lasted a week, and Judge Tomlinson reserved his decision, which he delivered in the Whangārei District Court this week.

The court heard that between 2018 and 2020, Kumar was employed at the Walton St service station in Whangārei.

More than $100,000 of the business’ money was alleged to have been stolen by Kumar during that time.

Representative charges for 2018, 2019 and 2020 were laid, rather than individual charges for each transaction, which would have amounted to more than 700 charges.

At the trial, CCTV evidence showed Kumar at the point-of-sale (POS) system for 21 transactions, which related to the thefts in 2020.

To carry out the acts, Kumar entered either a fake or a legitimate sale, which he then refunded and pocketed the cash.

Judge Tomlinson said the system was hopeless.

“When I first heard the evidence, I thought I was mishearing,” Judge Tomlinson said.

“Even in the 80s and 90s, cash systems were better than what I heard about in this case.

“The unaccounted shrinkage or excess stock that should appear sold wasn’t. The cash missing was unnoticed; all of that should have been perfectly obvious.”

The judge said it was inexcusable for an organisation closely managing liquid petroleum to have systems that did not show stock missing.

“It truly beggars belief. The point-of-sale software failures are, quite frankly, mind-blowing.”

No CCTV footage was produced at trial for any of the other sales the Crown alleged were fraudulent, and Judge Tomlinson criticised the investigation for failing to collect crucial evidence.

“There were gaps. The Crown should have asked questions like, ‘Can we prove it on a particular day absent of the CCTV? Who was working on a particular day? Are there occasions his log-in was used when he wasn’t there at all? Is the defendant’s log-in used significantly more than others?’,” the judge said in his decision.

“These questions do not appear to be asked and certainly weren’t answered, and they should have been.”

The judge said rosters and payroll evidence were not provided, and there were up to 10 log-ins being used on the POS.

“Log-in equals operator was plainly incorrect from the evidence I saw. Everything fails from this point.

“Was he actually working that day? Probably, but can’t be sure. Maybe, but can’t be sure. Was this a genuine refund? Who knows?

“‘Probably’ is not enough.”

Judge Tomlinson said the case lacked information and was supported by suspicions.

Although he was sure it was Kumar in the CCTV footage stealing on 21 occasions, relating to charge three, the judge could not find him guilty on the remaining two charges.

“Whilst suspicion is to a high level, I cannot be sure. On charges one and two, Mr Kumar is acquitted.“

Kumar was convicted on the one charge and sentenced to 100 hours of community work and ordered to pay a reparation of $1800.

Shannon Pitman is a Whangārei-based reporter for Open Justice covering courts in the Te Tai Tokerau region. She is of Ngāpuhi/ Ngāti Pūkenga descent and has worked in digital media for the past five years. She joined NZME in 2023.