THE wife of a former KPMG director accused of fiddling £44,000 in expenses to fund his gambling habit has defended her husband.
Brian Chapman, 55, is on trial at the Old Bailey for double-claiming for hotels and flights as well as pocketing refunds for cancelled flights between 2007 and 2011.
Mr Chapman, who commuted from Scotland to London, racked up £94,000 in credit card debts by 2011, the court heard. But his wife Margaret said that she was unconcerned about his gambling habit and unaware of the full extent of his debts.
The part-time supply teacher said she had never considered her husband to be dishonest, adding: "We have been married for 23 years. I know him very well."
On his gambling, she said: "I was quite happy. I did not think it was a problem. I thought it was under control."
Under cross-examination, Mrs Chapman said her husband had never told her there were any serious money troubles. When pressed, Mrs Chapman recalled one occasion when she had seen their mortgage repayments had bounced.
Mr Lodge went on: "You were aware of Brian's gambling or betting. What was the maximum he would bet? She said: "It varies."
Mr Chapman, of Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, denies fraud.
The trial was adjourned until Monday.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article