Woman jailed for stealing €270,000 from solicitors firm

A financial controller who stole €270,000 from a solicitors firm to pay off her ex-husband’s gambling debts has been jailed for 18 months.

Donna Magee, with an address in Holyfields, Dungannon, Co Tyrone, had previously pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to stealing in excess of €270,000 from her then employers, O'Mara Geraghty McCourt Solicitors.

She did so over the course of several months, by making transfers into her own bank account.

During a sentencing hearing on Friday, counsel for Donna Magee asked that she be given a week before starting her sentence in order to make arrangements for her 14-year-old daughter.

This was refused by Judge Martin Nolan, who said the case involved "too serious an offence".

Magee, a 47-year-old mother-of-one, worked as a financial controller at O’Mara Geraghty McCourt Solicitors in Dublin between late 2007 and June 2009, before irregularities in the firm’s accounts were discovered.

On Friday, the judge said: “[Magee] was in a position of trust and she abused that trust . . . It was a dreadful thing to do.”

He handed down a three-year sentence, but suspended the final 18 months.

Elva Duffy BL, prosecuting, said Magee had a “very significant level of control of the running of the [company’s] accounts” and made payments to herself through systems that appeared to be legitimate but, in fact, were not.

Det Sean O’Riordan told the court Magee had full authority to do the transfers.

He said that, as part of the Garda investigation, Magee’s accounts, which held €173,000, were frozen.

This amount was eventually recovered by the solicitors firm, so there is still approximately €100,000 outstanding, he said.

Previous convictions

Magee has a number of previous convictions in Northern Ireland, including for forgery.

She served nine months in prison in 2014 for offences committed in the North.

Bernard Condon SC, defending, said Magee was the sole carer of her daughter.

He said she worked hard to rebuild her life and gain sole custody of her child in 2015 after she was released from prison.

“Her genuine reason to exist is her daughter,” Mr Condon said.

“Her husband had issues with gambling, so the pressure was on her to provide.”

He said Magee was put under a lot of pressure in relation to loans that her husband had taken out, and she said she only took the money in order to pay her husband’s debts.