A former Manchester City executive who stole over £100,000 from last season’s treble winners to pay for her lavish wedding and buy gifts for her husband and family has been ordered to pay back just £2,550.
Fiona Barclay worked as a business development manager for City within the football club’s hospitality department, earning up to £30,000 a year before she was jailed in November last year for fraud.
The 34-year-old was today ordered to pay back just £2,550, appearing over video-link from her native Falkirk for a Proceeds of Crime Act Hearing.
At the beginning of the hearing when asked if she was alone on the video call, she told the judge that her seven-week-old baby was next to her.
Judge Timothy Smith said: ‘In light of everything uploaded, the benefit figure is £104,934.16, arising out of general criminal conduct.
Fiona Barclay (pictured previously) appeared over video-link from her native Falkirk for a Proceeds of Crime Act Hearing today where she was ordered to pay back just £2,550
‘The available amount is £2,550. This must be paid back by October 6.’
He said the confiscation of the monies is to be paid as compensation directly to Manchester City Football Club.
In November last year, Manchester Crown Court heard that Barclay was rumbled after accountants flagged a suspicious transaction, when a refund of £25,000 had been issued in March last year.
Ms Shaw said it aroused suspicion ‘by the fact it was a large round number’. Barclay was questioned and she admitted she’d made an ‘error’, and apologised.
She admitted depositing £15,000 of the sum into her own bank account, and paid it back to the club. But the club investigated further and discovered that Barclay had been siphoning money from the club since June 2019.
In total she had stolen more than £104,000. At the time, City remained £89,000 out of pocket, after Barclay paid back the £15,000. Barclay faced internal disciplinary proceedings at the club and was sacked in March 2021.
After a criminal investigation was launched, she told police she’d used the cash to pay for ‘various parts of her wedding’, and for buying ‘gifts for her husband and family’. She pleaded guilty to an offence of fraud by abuse of position.
Her barrister, Patrick Buckley, said Barclay is ‘utterly disgusted with herself’. ‘There is nothing in terms of reason or logical reason why she did what she did,’ he added.
Since being sacked by City, she has found a new job with a travel firm and told them about her conviction. Barclay has also tried to contact City to arrange repayment of the money she stole but has not heard back from them, the court heard.
In total, the former business development manager had stolen more than £104,000 from the club
Judge Timothy Smith said the confiscation of the monies is to be paid as compensation directly to Manchester City Football Club (pictured)
Sending her to prison for 18 months, Recorder Ciaran Rankin said: ‘This is a tragedy, you have thrown so much away because of your dishonesty, and, I’m afraid, pure greed.’
‘You were employed in a good job, as a business development manager at Manchester City. Ultimately that was a job with some responsibility.’
The judge said relegation was not a word associated with Premier League champions City, but that she had ‘relegated’ herself. He added: ‘I’m afraid you have relegated yourself because of your greed and deception into the ranks of those who can no longer call themselves a person of good character.
Barclay, of Drum Farm Lane, Falkirk, was jailed for 18 months, of which she served half in prison and will serve the remainder on licence.
DailyMail
