Gambling businessman jailed for £120,000 charity fraud
A PHILANTHROPIC businessman who stole more than £120,000 from the charity he had set up has been jailed.
Tyrone Pooley, who lived in Coventry when his scam was discovered, pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to two charges of theft and one of supplying false information to the Charity Commission.
The 59-year-old was a trustee of the Fund for the Blind and Partially Sighted, which had been registered as a charity in 1990.
Judge Alan Parker told Pooley: "I accept you set up a charity about 20 years ago with the best of intentions.
"I am told you had been addicted to gambling nearly all your adult life. I’m not sure about that, but you are addicted to the thrill of leading an extravagant life."
Alka Brigue, prosecuting, said that Pooley had been a trustee of the Fund for the Blind and Partially Sighted, which had been registered as a charity in 1990.
In 2003 Coventry-based solicitors Varley-Hibbs were responsible for dealing with the legacy of a woman whose will stipulated the balance of her estate should go to charity.
The executors decided the £166,422 should go to the Fund for the Blind and Partially Sighted, so the money was paid to the charity, based at the Coventry University Technology Park, over a period from March 2003 until May 2009.
But in 2008 Jonathan Cooper, an investigator for the Charity Commission, identified a discrepancy in the charity’s accounts for 2006 which did not appear to tally with the money it had been paid via Varley-Hibbs.
When Pooley, who had stolen £60,000 from the Fund for the Blind and Partially Sighted during 2006, was contacted he wrote back to the Charities Commissioner falsely asserting that the funds were in a separate bank account.
He said he had not put it into the charity’s account due to illness, and would do so in due course – but in fact he had used the money himself and withdrawn cash from the charity.
But even the interest of the Charity Commission did not stop Pooley pilfering from the fund, and Miss Brigue said that in 2009 he stole a further £61,422.
When he was arrested in May last year Pooley accepted he had withdrawn large sums of money to fund his gambling addiction, the majority of it at a casino in Brighton.
But he stressed that cheques signed by fellow trustee Amanda Ryan from the charities accounts had been for legitimate purposes and had nothing to do with his offences.
Miss Brique said in 2009 Pooley was given a 45-week suspended sentence for cheating at gambling by manipulating a technical fault with an electronic roulette wheel to obtain £39,100 in a marathon 15-hour session at a Southampton casino.
Tom Walkling, defending, said it was hard to think of a higher degree of trust, but the thefts took place following a terrible personal breakdown for Pooley.
"He was the owner and director of a business in Coventry; rather a successful business, which allowed him to set up a charity and try to give a little back to the community.
"For 15 years prior to these offences he ran the charity in his own time and did a lot of good.
"But his business burned down in 2003, and he discovered he was under-insured. As a result he was declared bankrupt, and he lost his business and lost his home.”
Pooley moved away to rented accommodation in Brighton, where his loss of money and status led to the offence there.
Mr Walking added: "He has had a gambling addiction all his life. That led him to think he could use the money donated to the charity to try to rebuild his fortunes and then pay back the money. He genuinely believed he was going to win every time he gambled.”
Pooley now works for a charity in Bristol, where he recruits fundraisers but is not involved with handling money.
Read more: Gambling businessman jailed for £120,000 charity fraud | Coventry Observer
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