Manager who stole £900k from bosses blew £40k on Halloween party

Office manager who stole more than £900,000 from her bosses to fund luxury lifestyle blew £40,000 on Halloween party at 16th century castle

• Emma Hunt, 37, scammed property firm McLean Properties in Edinburgh
• Office manager treated friends and family to extravagant VIP days out at events
• Hunt also took her mother to a five-star all-inclusive resort in the Caribbean 

An office manager who stole more than £900,000 from her bosses to fund a luxury lifestyle blew £40,000 on a Halloween party at a 16th century castle.

Emma Hunt, 37, scammed a large property firm in Edinburgh by pocketing rent payments made by tenants over three years.

Rents being paid to McLean Properties were being diverted straight into bank accounts controlled by Hunt – who used the money to fund the lifestyle of a millionaire despite having a salary of £1,800 per month. 

Hunt used the stolen funds to go on a spending spree on luxury holidays, high-end hotels and expensive cars. 

In 2018, she threw a fancy dress Halloween party for around 80 people at the 16th century Fenton Tower near North Berwick, East Lothian. The marquee alone cost more than £12,000 while the total bill came to £39,244. 

Office manager Emma Hunt (pictured), 37, scammed a large property firm in Edinburgh by pocketing rent payments made by tenants over three years

Friends and family were treated to extravagant VIP days out at Six Nations rugby matches, Musselburgh Racecourse, and the Scottish Open golf championship. Hunt took her mother to a five-star all-inclusive resort in the Caribbean and enjoyed a weekend trip to Dublin where she shelled out £6,590.

Hunt’s elaborate scheme fell apart after a tenant queried the payments, leading to bosses exposing her crimes.

The office manager went on trial at Edinburgh Sheriff Court after denying the offences and spun a web of lies when she gave evidence.

The fraudster made outrageous claims that a boss at the property firm, now deceased, allowed her to spend the cash to buy her silence. 

Hunt told jurors the manager was putting up prostitutes in flats – but the jury rejected her claims and found her guilty of stealing more than £900,000. Hunt told friends that she had made her fortune from running her own cleaning business.

A source said: ‘Hunt is a fantasist but she is also very clever. The way she was able to keep this fraud from being discovered for such a long time shows she knew what she was doing.’

The court heard how Hunt’s crimes started shortly after she started working as an office manager at McLean Properties in 2016. Fiscal depute Connor Muir read a joint minute of agreed facts to the jury which detailed Hunt’s wild splurges.

Before spending almost £40,000 on a Halloween party in 2018, Hunt had booked a birthday party for herself and 19 others at Musselburgh Racecourse in East Lothian for £3,000 two years prior.

In 2018, Hunt threw a fancy dress Halloween party for around 80 people at the 16th century Fenton Tower (pictured). The total bill came to almost £40,000

Hunt later splashed out on hospitality for Ladies Day at the same racecourse for 20 people in both 2017 and 2018, paying £6,360 and £6,600 respectively. In 2018 she bankrolled hospitality packages for 12 friends at the Scottish Open at £300 per person.

A further £,7180 was spent at Murrayfield Stadium for hospitality packages for 10 people at the Scotland v England Six Nations clash. 

The prosecutor told how she spent at least £23,219 on accommodation around Edinburgh at a string of top class hotels, such as the high-end Principal and the five star Caledonian, between 2016 and 2019.

Mr Muir detailed holidays that Hunt lavished on herself, including the Caribbean trip with her mum between December 31, 2018, and January 10, 2019, which cost £7,944. She spent £1,674 on flights for a weekend trip to Dublin in 2018, paying for accommodation at the plush Westbury Hotel.

In 2016 Hunt paid £19,500 for a new Audi S1 Quattro which she traded in for a BMW M2. Hunt had to pay a further £35,000 for the BMW on top of trading in the Audi. The scam artist also spent £6,730.05 at the Louis Vuitton fashion house. She also sent £91,596 in 45 separate transactions to her brother’s farming contracting business.

McLean Properties – understood to be controlled by members of Edinburgh’s well-known Crolla family – feared money might be missing for several months before Hunt was caught. The jury was told Hunt’s key role in controlling financial paperwork allowed her to continue covering her tracks.

Hunt had been giving her bank account details to tenants rather than the company’s for rent payments. She also took deposits from student tenants who weren’t usually charged this fee according to company policy. A later ruse involved her amending invoices from outside firms carrying out services including maintenance.

Hunt went on trial at Edinburgh Sheriff Court (pictured) after denying the offences and spun a web of lies when she gave evidence

Hunt came up with a further means to obtain funds, which involved her arranging new payments for old invoices which were already settled. She would then contact the firm which received the cash, claim it was a mistake, and have the sums repaid into her own account.

Her downfall came when a tenant contacted McLean Properties to say they’d been asked to change the account they made rent payments to. Bosses investigated and found money had poured into an account controlled by Hunt. She was sacked and the police were called in.

Hunt, now living in London, was convicted of embezzling £899,164.77 between 2016 and 2019. She received a further conviction of pretending to 11 renters that they had to pay deposits for flats when no sums were due, obtaining £7,295 by fraud.

And she was also found guilty of transferring money she took to her brother’s account – including buying a bulldozer, and purchasing goods, services, hospitality, holidays and cars. 

Sheriff John Mundy deferred sentence for reports.

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