Landmark decision by Falkirk Sheriff Court

A court has decreed money stolen from two charities should be returned to them and not the Treasury.

Lindsay MacCallum syphoned £86,000 from Rainbow Valley charity, set up in memory of her best friend's daughter, as well as £9,505 from the Anthony Nolan Trust.

McCallum was jailed for three years in October and has already paid back £25,000 of the money she stole from her former friend Angela MacVicar.

MacVicar said: “The court has done us justice."

It had been feared that if a criminal confiscation order was granted, the rest of the money MacCallum was due to repay would have gone to the Treasury.

Falkirk Sheriff Court was told it had been agreed with MacCallum's lawyers that confiscation proceedings should be paused to give her until March to repay the remaining outstanding funds.

Advocate Sarah Loosemore said "The best place for this money is for it to go back to the charities."

Asif Rashid, for the Crown, said it had been agreed with MacCallum’s lawyers that confiscation proceedings should be paused to give her until March to repay the remaining outstanding funds

Fiscal Rashid said that if the money was repaid by March 2025, court action by the Crown under the Proceeds of Crime Act would be withdrawn.

Mother-of-two MacCallum, of Aberfoyle, Perthshire, was told in October by her sentencing sheriff Maryam Labaki that she had “systematically and deliberately” perpetrated “calculating” frauds on the third sector organisations, and “betrayed” cancer victims.