A charity’s former director of finance was sentenced to six years and six months in prison Wednesday for stealing $904,000 from New Visions Toronto, depriving “some of the most vulnerable and needy” citizens of money for their day-to-day survival, a judge said.

In a scathing sentencing decision, Superior Court Judge Michael Quigley said that Marcia Motayne committed a “complex and well-planned fraud” that was an “egregious breach of trust” and had a “devastating impact” on people with disabilities who rely on New Visions Toronto for help.

“Those impacted the most by this crime are individuals … (who) depend on (New Visions Toronto) for their care and well-being. They are not people with a lot of money.”

The judge told Motayne that, as a professional chartered accountant, “(you) violated your ethical, moral and professional responsibilities to the organization that trusted you, and that seeks to support and protect these vulnerable persons.”

A jury found the 51-year-old mother of two guilty of one count of fraud over $5,000 after a three-week trial in June.

During his closing address, Crown attorney Andrew Max told jurors that over a three-and-a-half-year period, the certified accountant diverted $904,000 into her own bank accounts, and used the money to buy a new Lincoln SUV, put a roof on her house and travel to South America to watch the World Cup.

Motayne, who has been in custody since her conviction, applied for bail on Wednesday, pending an appeal. The Crown is opposing release based on concerns that she might flee to her native Guyana, despite living in Canada for more than 30 years. Defence lawyer Craig Bottomley urged Justice Michael Tulloch to release Motayne, saying the Crown’s concern is speculative. Tulloch reserved his decision.

New Visions Toronto offers supportive housing to children and adults with complex physical and developmental disabilities, according to the charity’s website. The fraud had an enormous impact on the agency, which relies primarily on taxpayers’ dollars, the judge wrote. The charity “is overwhelmed by the damage caused. It now finds it must work harder to regain the trust of everyone who has been impacted by this offender’s conduct.”

While employed there, Motayne was making a salary of between $66,000 and $85,000 a year.

Despite all the aggravating factors, Quigley said he could not accede to the Crown’s request for a prison sentence of eight to 10 years, which he called excessive given comparable legal cases.

But he rejected the defence submission that a four-year prison term was appropriate, given that Motayne did not plead guilty “to the offence the jury found, on overwhelming cogent and persuasive evidence, that (she) so obviously committed.”

He also ordered her to repay New Visions Toronto $795,668.71. She has six years from the date of her release from prison to pay, or face an additional three years in prison.

While the amount stolen was $904,784.80, the charity’s net loss exceeds $1 million once an additional $300,000 of audit and legal fees is taken into account.

It puts the matter into “shocking perspective” to realize that the disabled persons supported by this charity received a net allowance of only about $150 a month, “an amount that pales in comparison to the amounts Ms. Motayne was stealing, ranging from $4,000 to $5,000 in some months to over $20,000 in others,” Quigley stated.

The judge also found “stark and reprehensible evidence of her moral culpability,” for causing the charity to fire a clerk based on Motayne’s false complaints of employee incompetence.

“She needed that employee to be fired because otherwise, sooner or later the clerk would have become aware of the fraud she was running day-to-day for over three years,” Quigley said.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

The judge noted Motayne has not “expressed even the slightest sense of remorse.”

“I have presided over many fraud trials, but never one that displays such cold criminal conduct,” Quigley said. “It offends me to the core. It does the same to this community.”