Cork post office teller stole over €10k in pension payments

A teller who worked at a post office in Bishopstown, Co Cork, for 10 years was stealing payments that were due to pensioners that amounted to over €10,000.

Claire Molloy, aged 33, of 2 The Hawthorns, Kilbrogan, Bandon, yesterday received a two-and-a-half-year suspended sentence at Cork Circuit Criminal Court. She was ordered to do 200 hours of community service.

Judge David Riordan said the accused had targeted clients who might not notice they had been left short in payments.

He said the first injured party were the pensioners who were short-changed — literally. Second was the State, in terms of repayment of the pensioners; and finally there was the postmaster who had the contract with the Department of Social Protection as he paid the department the amount that was taken by his then employee, Molloy.

Detective Garda Alan McCarthy said the modus operandi in this case consisted of a pensioner calling in to collect five accumulated weeks of pension being given four weeks and the accused keeping the fifth payment for herself.

She has since repaid the money in full.

Brendan Kelly, defending, said the chances of recidivism were zero and that she had paid a price for her wrongdoing by her loss of reputation. He said she had resorted to the crimes due to financial pressures. “Her reputation has been destroyed as a consequence and she will have to live with that. Her employer held her in high esteem prior to this.”