Bert van Hees
African News Agency
A FORMER credit controller and gift card assistant at Canal Walk, who allegedly devised a scheme to scam the shopping mall out of more than R700 000, faces multiple fraud charges.
Megan Dominique Brandt, 27, of Bothasig, appeared in the Specialised Commercial Crime Court yesterday before magistrate Sabrina Sonnenberg.
She faces 272 fraud charges, involving R766 683, allegedly perpetrated between 2011 and 2013.
The charge sheet states that the mall’s primary source of income comes from shop rentals, as well as gift card sales from the mall’s three visitor information centres.
At the end of each day, cash-up sheets reflecting the total money received from gift card sales were placed in safes at each information desk. Brandt had to deposit the total amount into the Canal Walk Shopping Gift Voucher bank account.
According to the charge sheet, Brandt would reflect the correct daily amounts on a cash reconciliation statement for management purposes.
However, prosecutor Gertrude Magopeni alleged that she would then bank a lesser amount and keep the shortfalls for herself.
It is alleged that on one occasion, she received R99 520, but deposited only R88 070 and kept the R11 450 difference for herself. On another occasion, she received R56 590, but only deposited R21 230 and kept R35 360 for herself, it is alleged.
On yet another occasion, she allegedly received R30 890, but deposited only R12 080 and kept R18 810 for herself.
In yesterday’s proceedings, the prosecutor said the case needed further investigation and requested a postponement to August 31 for trial. This was because the case was taken from another prosecutor.
Defence attorney Keith Gess objected to the postponement on the grounds that the case was supposed to have been trial-ready in November. He requested that the case be removed from the court roll instead.
The magistrate, however, granted the postponement on the grounds that there had been a change in prosecutors.