Gambling Addiction: Cleaner cleans out account

Birmingham professor is cleaned out by his cleaner


A CLEANER with a chronic gambling addiction emptied a Birmingham professor’s bank account after stealing a bank card from his home.

Adrian Flanagan, 36, who siphoned off more than £14,000, was sentenced to 50 weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for a period of two years.

The former Land Rover worker, of School Road, Yardley Wood, was also ordered to carry out 100 hours’ unpaid work and pay £14,041 compensation after admitting theft between March and June this year.

Judge Rupert Mayo said: “It was a wicked breach of trust in that you stole a bank card and pin details from someone who trusted you to be in their home unsupervised.”

But the judge said he accepted Flanagan had tried to get help to beat his “ghastly” addiction and that he had saved up enough to pay a third of the money back.


Rhydian James, prosecuting, at Birmingham Crown Court, said that Flanagan worked with his partner, who owned her own cleaning business, and added that he took the card from Prof Stephen Field while working at his home.

Mr James said, over about a three-month period, Flanagan used the card 56 times to withdraw the money from three different cash points.

He said Prof Field had not been aware of what was going on because he did most of his banking on the internet.

It was only when he made a transfer that he realised that an account was overdrawn, Mr James told the court.

Mr James said that police later looked at CCTV and identified Flanagan using the card to withdraw £500 from a cash point at the Maypole.

Joe Louis, defending, said Flanagan was ashamed about what he had done and that he would be able to pay Prof Field back the full amount within 18 months.

He added that if he went to prison it would devastate his family.