Former Selwyn District Council manager sentenced after stealing $25,500

Lisa Larkin appearing in court for sentencing. Photo / Geoff Sloan

A former Canterbury council manager who stole about $25,500 from her employer and a group which provides technology help to seniors has been sentenced.

Lisa Elaine Larkin, a former Selwyn District Council district community development adviser, was sentenced yesterday to nine months home detention for stealing about $18,500 from Selwyn SeniorNet and about $7000 from the district council.

She was sentenced on two charges of theft by a person in a special relationship and one of forgery. She pleaded guilty to the charges earlier this year.

Larkin has agreed to pay back about $3500 of the district council's money she claimed had gone towards buying whiteware from Smiths City, forging an invoice from the company and providing it to the district council.

It was later revealed the invoice did not originate from Smiths City. It had been modified on Larkin's work computer the same day she gave it to the council.

She was ordered by Judge Tom Gilbert to pay off the remaining amount she owes to SeniorNet and the district council in installments.

Larkin has made arrangements to pay back $3400 of the council's money, which she used at Smiths City, and was ordered by Judge Tom Gilbert to pay off the remaining amount she owes to SeniorNet and the district council in installments.

Gilbert called Larkin's crimes "highly premeditated fraud" against her employer and a charity group that trusted her.

Larkin spoke at the sentencing saying she was remorseful.

"If I could do things over, I would have done them very differently," she said.

- Starnews.co.nz