Former bank employee who swindled elderly man, jailed for 10 years

A court has handed a 10 year sentence to a fraudster who swindled an old man out of over €100,000 - an act which also cost a bank clerk her job.

53-year-old Joseph Francis Scerri, a former Mid-Med/HSBC employee who had worked with the bank for 23 years, swindled his victim out of €134,430 by convincing him to grant Scerri power of attorney on the pretence of using the money on various investments.

Scerri had issued several cheques in the victim’s name amounting to €134,430 on an APS account, before tricking HSBC cashier and Scerri’s former colleague, Marcette Cefai, into overriding the three day process for clearing APS cheques to cash them immediately.

The bank successfully recovered some of the funds, but €56,000 remained outstanding. As a result, the bank terminated Ms Cefai’s employment and deducted the €56,000 from her bank pension fund. 

The woman then filed court proceedings against Scerri, who she said, had called at her branch after having left his job at the bank, boasting of having started a successful business venture in Bulgaria.

She told the court that he had handed her some cheques to be cashed. Cefai had reminded the accused that cheques took three days to be cleared, but he manipulated his former colleague into handing over him the cash straight away.

A number of cheques later bounced due to lack of funds in the victim’s accounts. 

When interviewed by the police, the elderly victim said that he had trusted Scerri due to his long career at the bank and had allowed himself to be persuaded to grant Scerri power of attorney because of his difficulty in making sense of bank documents.

Scerri was later arrested and had admitted to the police that he had cashed the victim’s cheques, explaining that he had used the money to pay off other creditors. He told police that he had encountered financial difficulties after a car importation business of his had foundered. In court, he claimed that he had started the business with the victim, which explained the power of the attorney.

The court, however was in no doubt that Scerri was a fraud, noting that he did not back up this version of events with documentation and that his explanation did not hold water– not least because not one car had been imported, in spite of over €100,000 being withdrawn from the account.

Magistrate Anthony Vella sentenced Scerri to 10 years behind bars. Inspector Yvonne Farrugia prosecuted.