Salesi Latu Toumo'ua, an ATM technician who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars after he was put in charge by his boss, will spend more time in jail after prosecutors appealed his sentence.
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Toumo'ua's offending on these charges began in May last year, when G&A Security owner Glen Tibbitts, had to fly to Melbourne for a family emergency, leaving Toumo'ua in charge in Canberra.
Toumo'ua used the opportunity late one night to take keys to St George ATMs from a safe at the company's Weston office. He drove to ATMs at the Charnwood, Mitchell and Wanniassa shops, using the keys to access the machines and take the cash.
Another $244,000 was allegedly stolen from an ATM in Queanbeyan that same night.
A few days later, Toumo'ua drove the stolen money to Melbourne and stashed it in a storage unit. Over five months he went on to gamble the cash, using mainly a Tabcorp telephone betting account.
He bet more than $50,000 on Hawthorn Football Club to win that year's AFL premiership and pocketed winnings of $152,000. He gambled $71,461 in cash at nine Tabcorp outlets in Melbourne in 24 hours and lost more than $16,000 gambling at Crown Casino.
Toumo'ua was arrested after police searched the storage unit and found betting tickets, $193,000 in cash and an ATM receipt.
Justice Hilary Penfold had sentenced Toumo'ua to five years' jail with a non-parole period of 20 months. On Wednesday, Chief Justice Helen Murrell said the ACT Court of Appeal had now ruled he will instead serve a six-year sentence, with three years behind bars.
