NHS manager jailed after gambling away £92k of Dudley Trust's budget
Alec Gandy has been sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison
An NHS manager who defrauded his trust of more than £120,000 and used most of it to fund his gambling habit has been jailed.
Alec Gandy was a senior operational manager at Dudley Integrated Health and Care NHS Trust when he made fake temporary worker accounts using his friend and his ex-wife's details, the Crown Prosecution Service said.
He logged his friend Matthew Lane as a physician's assistant and his ex-wife Kaylee Wright as a paramedic before authorising invoices to be paid to them totalling more than £123,000.
The CPS said the pair then transferred much of the money back to Gandy, 42, who spent more than £92,000 of it on gambling and transferred a further £12,000 to his own businesses.
Gandy carried out the fraud for 16 months from August 2022 and when the Dudley trust identified the fraudulent activity, they alerted the NHS Counter Fraud Authority which investigated after the 42-year-old left his job.
A court heard in a victim impact statement from the trust's director of finance that the money Gandy swindled to gamble away could have been used to improve patient care, the CPS said.
It could have paid for four nursing associates for a year.
Gandy, of Kidderminster, Worcestershire, was sentenced on Friday at Wolverhampton Crown Court to two-and-a-half years in prison after previously pleading guilty to fraud by abuse of position, the CPS said.
Lane, 44, of Evesham, Worcestershire, and Wright, 38, also of Kidderminster, pleaded guilty to money laundering offences.
The 44-year-old was sentenced to 12 months in prison, suspended for 18 months and was ordered to carry out 200 hours unpaid work. Wright was handed an 18-month community order, plus a requirement to carry out 25 days of rehabilitation activity.
Ben Reid, CPS specialist prosecutor, said: "This case represents a serious breach of trust that diverted vital NHS funds meant for patient care. Gandy abused his position of responsibility as a public servant, while Lane and Wright knowingly participated in the scheme to facilitate this fraud.
"Fraud is not victimless and when such crimes are committed, they have a range of impacts - in this case, not only was money defrauded from the trust, but time and money had to be spent on an internal investigation."
The CPS said it will pursue confiscation proceedings against Gandy.
Ben Harrison, head of operations at the NHS Counter Fraud Authority, said: "This outcome endorses the value of our robust and objective approach to ensuring that anyone who attempts to defraud the NHS is brought to justice.
"This was a calculated scheme that diverted significant public funds away from frontline patient care."