A lottery insider faked a £2.5millon jackpot winning ticket for his rapist co-conspirator inside Camelot’s headquarters, a whistleblower has claimed.
Giles Knibbs worked as a fraud expert for the company when he was suspected of plotting with his friend Eddie Putman to help him land an unclaimed prize.
Up until now it is believed Knibbs tipped Putman off and told him the numbers and shop where he needed to buy the ticket from.
But now a Camelot source has sensationally claimed Knibbs printed it inside the organisation’s offices and warns there is nothing to stop it from happening again.
Giles Knibbs worked as a fraud expert for the company in 2009 when he was suspected of giving friend Eddie Putman vital information to help him land an unclaimed prize.
So far
Clever Knibbs, 38, had a 24 hour access to a ticket printing machine in the fraud department and was paid to pour over the details of false claims.
The Camelot source, who worked alongside Knibbs for years at the Watford offices, said if someone knew how to cheat the system, it would have been Giles.
The employee believes it could happen again and has accused Camelot bosses of attempting to ‘hush up’ the investigations.
The new allegation will provide fresh clues for police who continue to investigate the suspected con.
The house in Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, where Putman lived in 2012 when he was convicted of benefits fraud
The fraud expert struck up an unlikely friendship with Putman after he employed him as a builder.
While Knibbs was educated at university and studied computer science, Putman had already clocked up a number of convictions for rape, grievous bodily harm and robbery.
But as their worlds collided, it is suspected Knibbs gave Putman a tip off about where a winning ticket was purchased from for a prize which went unclaimed.
Two days before the deadline was due to close, Putman handed in his ticket with the correct numbers.
But now a whistleblower believes a ticket was created by Knibbs and passed off as Putman’s.
A source told The Mirror: ‘If there was a back door to be able to carry out a fraud he would have known it. He was taught the back doors.’
He said there were several printers in the office, including one in the fraud department, and Knibbs had a pass with 24/7 access.
The anonymous person said: ‘He may have gone in at any time. It wasn’t unusual for him to be there late at night. He’d have had to scan tickets and to do that he needed a machine with a barcode scanner.
‘He’s manipulated that somehow. I believe Knibbs actually created a ticket, there’s no other way he could do it. He would have seen the draw and he would have manipulated the ticket after the draw was done.
‘He would have had access to the computer system to be able to do that because he was a fraud investigator. It would have had the correct date on it.’
The worker, who wishes to remain unnamed, told The Sunday Mirror internal auditiors had sent the organisation into a meltdown with one employee saying: ‘We’re in trouble’.
A Hertfordshire Constabulary spokesman said: ‘The case is currently being reviewed by police so we cannot comment at this stage.’
A Camelot spokesman told the newspaper they were ‘unable to confirm or deny any speculation about the case’.