Two longserving Meyer shipping company employees were jailed for 21 months between them yesterday for stealing almost $200,000 from the firm.Stephen Paynter, 59, worked for the company for 35 years before being fired over the theft. Debra Pacheco, 53, also spent more than three decades with the company before she was dismissed.Magistrates’ Court heard from prosecutor Cindy Clarke that father-of-two Paynter, of St George’s, was Vice President of Meyer Freight at the time and on the board of parent company W.E Meyer & Co.Pacheco, a mother-of-two of Pembroke, was in charge of maintaining Meyer’s accounting.Ms Clarke said a police investigation started in 2009 after concerns were raised over the company’s accounts.Pacheco was found to have deliberately falsified the accounts receivable. She also concealed unpaid or misappropriated customer payments through the use of other customer payments.The profits went into her pockets and she used the funds to go on shopping sprees.Ms Clarke said the Crown had bank records showing Pacheco made large payments on her credit cards on a regular basis. One payment on her American Express card alone was $66,000.Ms Clarke said Pacheco spent more than $25,000 on her American Express card in 2006 alone.A total of 92 percent of Pacheco’s income over the period of the three year crime went on shopping, and Ms Clarke said she committed the crime to “support her lavish lifestyle”.During an internal company investigation before the police were called in, Paynter confessed that he committed a similar offence.He admitted to collecting customer payments and on occasion using the cash received for his personal use. He would then instruct Pacheco to apply other customer payments to cover the shortfall.Paynter told investigators that he kept a note of the funds he took and when security fears over the accounts began to be raised, paid the money back to make right what he had done.Police found documents showing that the total theft through mis-posting of accounts totaled $190,490.23, and that was the sum listed in the charges against the pair.The documents showed that of that sum, almost $111,000 was received and receipted by Payner.The pair admitted to theft and conspiracy to defraud during a Magistrates’ Court hearing earlier this year. Pacheco also admitted false accounting.Ms Clarke said $190,490.23 was the amount of stolen funds that could be documented during Meyer’s investigation into the pair, which covered the period 2007 to 2009.However, she said, there was actually a total shortfall in Meyer’s accounts receivable ledger of $2.1 million.“It could not be established, due to the minimal scope of the investigation, the length of time that the misappropriation of funds had been occurring,” said Ms Clarke.Paynter’s defence lawyer Richard Horseman told the court that Paynter was in tears when he was interviewed by the police about the crime.He said he spent the stolen money on school fees and a car and it was “more out of need than extravagance”. He is now unemployed.He told the court: “I just want to reiterate my sincere remorse and regret for my actions. My parents brought me up way, way better than that.”Pacheco’s lawyer Jaymo Durham said his client had experienced abusive relationships, and her extravagant spending was prompted by a “lack of positive self image”.He said she is now employed as a house cleaner, and is “trusted” in that role.Pacheco cried as she apologised to her former employer and her family.“It was an awful thing to do and I’m really sorry and remorseful that I did it,” she said.Jailing the pair, Magistrate Khamisi Tokunbo described it as a “pretty sad case and an unpleasant one for me to have to be dealing with, two people who have dedicated themselves to their employers and employment for three decades and who should now be looking at retirement and leisure but, rather, find themselves pretty much down and out having put everything at risk.”He said Paynter’s sentence is a total of 15 months, of which he must spend nine months behind bars. The rest will be suspended for 18 months, as long as he stays out of trouble.Pacheco’s sentence is two years in jail, of which she must spend half in prison. The rest will be suspended for 18 months.