Sally Connolly (pictured) only had to pay back £20 of the £47,000 she took from her son’s school PTA in Didsbury, Manchester
A mother who stole £47,000 from the PTA at her child’s primary school has been ordered to pay back just £20.
Sally Connolly had earlier been spared jail because a judge agreed that a custodial sentence would have disrupted her son’s GCSEs.
Connolly, 43, was chairman of the Parent and Teachers’ Association at the Roman Catholic school when she began taking money raised from school fairs and cake sales to pay off credit card bills.
The mother-of-two siphoned off £47,000 between 2010 and 2015, paying the money into accounts belonging to her 47-year-old husband John, who works at a catering company, and her mother. Neither was aware of the source of the money.
When the school noticed the missing funds, she confessed to the governors and was taken to court in June.
Minshull Street Crown Court, in Manchester, was told she had paid back £20,000 to St Catherine’s School in Didsbury.
Connolly admitted five counts of theft. She was handed a two-year suspended sentence after a judge heard sending her to jail would be disruptive to her family, particularly as her son was sitting his GCSEs.
The 43-year-old (pictured right) transferred the stolen money into her’s and her husband John’s (pictured left), 47, bank account over a period of five years
Financial investigators discovered another £27,000 was missing and Connolly was hauled back to court last week.
But after the judge heard her finances were in ‘chaos’, she was ordered to pay only £20 as a ‘nominal’ fee.
She was told to pay within three months or face three days in jail. Keith Graham, a financial investigator for Greater Manchester Police, said Connolly would have to pay back the cash should her circumstances improve in the future.
Connolly, who had lived in a rented £450,000 detached home in Cheadle, near Stockport, was ‘ostracised’ at the school after her actions, her defence lawyer said in an earlier hearing.
Nicola Gatto, defending, said Connolly was on medication for ‘social anxiety’ and endured 12 months of shame when she continued to drop off her daughter at the school.
Her household income was less than £40,000 at the time and the court heard the family was struggling financially.
Miss Gatto said: ‘She didn’t get this role with the view to steal money. She gave many, many hours of voluntary work to make this flourish. She didn’t spend this money on luxury living, she used some of the money to supplement her family who were struggling.’
She was originally expected to pay back every penny, but when the judge heard her finances were ‘in chaos’ she was excused. She is pictured on her wedding day
Connolly (pictured centre) was spared jail because the judge thought a custodial sentence would disrupt her son’s GCSE exams