'Grifter' accountant who stole £330k splashed out on hol pad and flash car

Shifted employer's funds into his account for 3 years

- ANDREW BARDSLEY

A GREEDY accountant who stole more than £330,000 from his employers and splashed out on a Range Rover and a holiday home has been locked up.

Laurence Hearldon, 39, was sacked from his position as a senior managing clerk at a ‘successful’ Cheetham Hill based wholesale fashion company when his crime was discovered.

Hearldon was a ‘liked’ and ‘trusted’ employee with Sanjeev 1979 Ltd, but he had secretly siphoned off the firm’s funds into his own accounts for nearly three years. The father, from Salford, said he had begun making the fraudulent transactions after falling into debt.

But Manchester Crown Court heard that he had bought a Range Rover and a holiday home in Blackpool. “These purchases prove that the only explanation for your offending is greed,” Judge Sarah Johnston told him.

“I’m also entirely satisfied from everything that I have read and heard that the majority of your offending was to provide a lifestyle beyond your means.”