AN ARMIDALE drug addict’s three-hour crime spree using a stolen credit card has sparked a warning from an Armidale magistrate over latest credit card technology.
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Magistrate Karen Stafford expressed concern about “pay wave” techology for using credit cards and “how easy it is for fraud to happen”.
She convicted Carol Quinlan of dishonestly obtaining goods using the tap-and-go payment system.
Quinlan appeared via videolink from prison before Armidale Local Court on Monday.
She pleaded guilty to six charges including dishonestly obtaining property, shoplifting and using an altered or forged prescription. Defence solicitor Peter Hamblin said his client had significant “substance abuse problems”, exacerbated by her father’s illness.
That had led to Quinlan suffering mental health issues that required her to be transferred to another prison for medical supervision.
While acknowledging it was “not the first time his client had been in custody” he said she had in the past been involved in many volunteer projects in Armidale.
“A lot of work was done under her supervision by way of tree planting,” Mr Hamblin said.
The credit card used by Quinlan had been stolen in a home invasion and used to commit “almost teenage children-type offences” and purchase “cigarettes and sweets”, Mr Hamblin said
“[The offences are] of a lesser seriousness in the scheme of things.” But Magistrate Stafford said the crime posed a significant risk.
“[There is] community concern about pay wave, how easy it is for fraud to happen,” she said.
She gave Quinlan a 12-month suspended sentence for the credit card and shoplifting charge, as well as a four-month suspended sentence for the false prescription offence.
