A british woman gamblede over a million dollars away in search of more money for her son, toby’s, in the treatment of cancer. money she had received through donations from the boy’s school and private persons.
Now release the she jail, after a judge accepted her explanation that she was under ’tremendous pressure’.
The writing several british media including BBC, The Guardian and Sky News.
The 32-year-old Stacey explained that she began to play for money on the internet for to raise money for cancer treatment for his son, who suffered from the rare cancer neuroblastoma.
When she accepted his judgment on the two years of conditional imprisonment, approached the judge, Guy Kearl, to Stacey and explained:
You were overwhelmed by the situation, as you were in. You were under tremendous pressure, and I have no doubt that it all started because you wanted to raise money for his treatment.
Stacey Worsley lost over a million in the period January 2017, and until march of last year. Over a period of 12 days in november 2017, she lost alone and 173,000 euros.
You searched for the lost money. You realized that you had done more harm than good. It was a downward spiral that was bound to go wrong.
– No one can fail to be touched by your story, assessed the Guy Kearl.
He explained further that it was also a mitigating circumstance the fact that Stacey had not used the money on luxury items for themselves.
in court, it emerged that toby’s mother, who pleaded guilty to fraud at an earlier hearing, was struggling to cope with his son’s illness, while she took care of her two other children.
the Judge was also told that it had managed the police to raise 1.2 million dollars of stacey’s gambling debts from online gambling groups, and that this money will now be paid back to the donors and other charities.
stacey’s lawyer, Nicholas De La Poer, was told that gamblingen started with the best of intentions, but was developed into an addiction and a sanctuary from the everyday life, she found herself in.
Judge Guy Kearl explained that he had to give a suspended sentence, because she has betrayed a lot of people who have donated, just as her actions will inevitably have a negative effect on future donations.
In court, it also came to light that the football club Leeds United, as Toby was a big fan of, donated 200.000 pounds (1,7 million dollars, ed.) to his cancer treatment. None of the money went through Stacey, and was all spent on toby’s treatment.
Subsequently, a scan that toby’s treatment had had an effect, and that he bone marrow was free of cancer. Unfortunately, he was shortly after diagnosed with a tumor in the brain, and died 12 January 2019.