Ex-Constable takes the stand over expenses fiddle claims

Thursday 05 June 2014

Former St John Constable Graeme Butcher told a jury he “forgot” to repay thousands of pounds worth of items that he purchased using Parish funds, the Royal Court heard yesterday.

And the former States Member said he didn’t realise he wasn’t entitled to expenses such as petrol until it was flagged up to him during initial investigations into his conduct in mid-2011.

Butcher (66) is charged with 15 counts of misconduct in a public office and of using Parish funds to purchase goods and services totalling over £2,500.

His offences, all of which are denied, include allegedly forging a duplicate invoice to omit details of a £16.95 stereo headset he is alleged to have purchased from Webb Holdings Limited using the Parish credit card

Butcher, who claimed he was “an honest Constable trying to do the best for my Parish”, claims all relevant documents were made available to parish officials and the Parish auditor during his five year period of office.

In June 2009, he is accused of ordering timber valued at £68.41 on the Parish account when it was for his own use, but claims that as the timber yard didn’t have a credit card facility he’d told them to put it on the Parish account.

He claims he then handed an annotated delivery note to the Parish Secretay but it wasn’t paid because “I completely forgot about it” and the invoice got “buried in the Parish accounts”.

Butcher is also accused of instructing the tradesman doing up his bathroom to take six lengths of timber from the Parish depot to complete the job as it was over the weekend, the timber yard wasn’t open and to have collected it himself would have damaged the roof of his car.

“It wasn’t something I thought was a major problem”, he told the court.

However, as he didn’t get the decorator’s invoice until some months later, and was never reminded by the Parish Secretary and forgot because there was a lot going on.

Similarly, when ordering items totalling around £90 from Iron Stores for decorating his home, he’d allegedly forgotten his credit card and so had ‘booked them to the Parish account with the intention of paying for them later, but again “forgot”.

Butcher who claims to have forgotten to repay a number of items he’d purchased using Parish funds has said he can’t explain why he‘d used the Parish credit card to order personal items on Amazon, despite his personal credit card being the default payment option.

The former Constable, who described his financial position as “reasonably comfortable” with two houses in St John, no mortgage and around £300,00 in assets, was first interviewed by police in December 2011, but wasn’t charged until November 2013, a delay he described as devastating and which had ”a major effect on my family and myself”.

He has since repaid the cost of all but one of the items he is alleged to have dishonestly purchased using Parish funds.

“All the things that have happened, I’m not denying that,” said Mr Butcher, “I’m denying the intent.”