Gambling addict stole €84,000 of laptops from employer to fund his addiction

Andrew McMorran, a native of South Africa who now lives in Cork, was stealing the laptops and putting them up for sale on DoneDeal

Andrew McMorran pleaded guilty to 21 sample counts of 117 counts in total of stealing Dell Latitude Laptops from his employer, the Pepper Group of Westpark Business Campus, Shannon, on dates between July 1, 2021, and March 31, 2023. Photo: Press 22

A gambling addict hooked on sports betting was able to steal an estimated €84,000 of laptops from his Shannon-based employer due to "very lax" stock supervision procedures in place, a court has heard.

Andrew McMorran, aged 43, pleaded guilty to 21 sample counts of 117 counts in total of stealing Dell Latitude Laptops from his employer, the Pepper Group of Westpark Business Campus, Shannon, on dates between July 1, 2021, and March 31, 2023.

Mr McMorran of Rosewood Rise, Bandon, Cork was stealing the laptops and putting them up for sale on DoneDeal to fund his gambling addiction.

Counsel for the State, Sarah Jane Comerford BL, told Ennis District Court that McMorran had a previous conviction for a similar offence where he received a suspended two-and-a-half-year prison term and fined €15,000 in June 2023 for 29 counts of stealing Lenovo laptops from a Cork-based multinational pharma firm between October 2020 and January 2021.

McMorran worked in the IT department at financial firm, Pepper Advantage Ireland, where he would format laptops and give them out to new employees or employees working from home.

Detective Garda Colm Moriarty told the court that when the laptops would be returned, Mr McMorran would mark them as ‘damaged’ or ‘unusable’, remove them from the premises and then put them up for sale.

Det. Garda Moriarty said that some of the offences took place during covid, and there was a big demand for laptops as people were working from home.

Det. Garda Moriarty said that the estimated cost of laptops stolen by Mr McMorran is €84,000 though “it is unknown as we don’t know how many were new and how many were old”.

Det. Moriarty agreed with counsel for McMorran, Patrick Whyms BL, that gardai at interview stated that he was able to steal the laptops because of "very lax" stock supervision by his employer.

Ms Comerford said that Jason Palmer, Head of Financial Crime at Pepper, first made a complaint to Rathfarnham gardaí in March 2023 concerning the suspected theft. This followed a stock take of laptops at Pepper's Shannon operation.

Mr McMorran was suspected of being the thief and he was first suspended and then fired by his employer.

Number of laptops

Det. Garda Moriarty said that McMorran presented a spreadsheet to gardaí showing that he had stolen 225 laptops. However, Det. Garda Moriarty said that these contained a large number of duplicates and the figure he had arrived at was 120.

Mr Whyms said that providing the list of stolen laptops to gardai “would not be typical behaviour of a criminal mastermind”. The Pepper Group was able to confirm 116 laptops as their own.

Det. Garda Moriarty said that an internal audit by Pepper showed that there were 234 laptops unaccounted for but said that there is no evidence to suggest that Mr McMorran was involved in any thefts beyond the 117 counts on the indictment before the court.

He said that the IT system was so poor at Pepper they were unable to say where the other laptops went. 

'Trustworthy and reliable'

Det. Moriarty agreed with Mr Whyms that McMorran was a very well-liked colleague at Pepper and colleagues were upset at having to make statements as part of the Garda investigation.

Garda Moriarty agreed that McMorran had no trappings of wealth and payments from his accounts showed evidence of his gambling addiction at the time. Mr Whyms said that McMorran is in recovery from his gambling addiction and has deleted all gambling apps off his phone.

McMorran is a native of Durban, South Africa, and arrived in Ireland 24 years ago and lives in Cork. He now works for a car park operator and made known his gambling addiction and legal issues at job interview.

Mr Whyms said that McMorran’s present employer describes him as “trustworthy and reliable”. A probation report states that he has taken full responsibility for his actions.

Judge Francis Comerford remanded him on continuing bail to March 25 to fix a date for sentence.