Desperate people in desperate circumstances leads to desperate actions, oftentimes with the desperate ones in an even deeper situation.
This is the case of domestic worker Marie L.M., who confessed guilt in court last September 9, 2015 for theft.
58-year old Marie admitted that she stole and pawned the jewelry of her employer in Kornhill. She has been working for the said employer for 22 years.
Marie pawned two gold pendants, one gold necklace and one gold ring, all from her 89-year old elderly female employer’s jewelry in July and August for a sum of $7000.
The amount is intended to be remitted to the Philippines to be used as payment for hospital bills. Her sister has leukemia and her husband who has hypertension and urinary tract infection recently suffered a stroke. Marie had already borrowed $20000 from her employer’s daughter-in-law who also gives her salary under the condition of $2000 monthly salary deductions. It was her husband’s recent stroke that the employer cannot loan her the $10000 initial payment for hospital bills that gave her the idea of the crime.
Marie’s lawyer says that, “There was no intention to deprive her employer on a permanent basis. She was going to pay off the pawnshop after four months.” Allegedly, she thought her employer who was suffering from Alzheimer’s wouldn’t notice if she pawned them and then returned them later.
Judge Chainrai said, “The theft involved here is a breach of trust … An immediate custodial sentence is appropriate.” Marie is sentenced to three weeks in prison for each of the theft charges that she pleaded guilty to but the judge ordered that they be served concurrently.
Marie is remorseful and her lawyer said that, “She wants to apologize directly to her employer.” Out of her four children, only one has a job and the others depend on her for support. Marie is currently jobless and has lost her entitlement to her long service pay. Since her arrest on September 8,she has no communication with her family and is worried where they would get the money to pay for her husband’s medicine which costs P2600 per day.