Orchestra chief faces prison over £645,000 fiddle
A former finance chief at the London Philharmonic Orchestra is facing jail for a swindle involving thousands of pounds to fund holidays, designer clothes, art and jewellery.
Cameron Poole admitted defrauding the orchestra of more than £645,000 by forging signatures on cheques and credit cards.
The money is said to have funded a lavish lifestyle and even an extension to his £900,000 home.
The Australian accountant was earning more than £60,000 a year as the orchestra's financial director when he carried out the fraud between January 2007 and November last year.
Poole, 35, who was married to a Conservative councillor in Herne Hill, admitted fraud by abuse of position and acquiring and using criminal property during a brief hearing at Southwark crown court.
His wife, Suzanne, who has parliamentary ambitions, has since separated from him and is understood to have discovered the extent of his spending from old credit card statements.
Judge Deborah Taylor granted bail but warned the "most likely outcome" of his case would be a custodial sentence.
Poole is paying off a £2.3 million High Court order from a civil action by the orchestra made this February.
He hid the payments he was making to himself by tapping in false entries on the orchestra's computerised accounting system and pretended the orchestra's expenditure was far less than its revenue. Poole was also in charge of running annual audits, leaving him free to steal more and more money from the LPO, which depends on public funds.
He claimed money had been paid to IMG Artists, which manages singers and musicians, when in fact he used the cash to pay a building contractor.
The father-of-three also wrote cheques and made bank transfers directly to himself, remaining undetected until he left the orchestra and was uncovered during an internal investigation.
Poole, an active member of his south London church, worked for accountancy firm Accenture and a child poverty charity in Africa before moving to the orchestra. Poole, of Herne Hill, is due to be sentenced on September 28.
