Coventry bank manager caught laundering £255,000 in an elaborate scheme

Heather Smalley was sentenced to two years in prison and suspended for two years.

Heather Smalley, 31, oversaw an elaborate money-laundering scheme.

A Coventry bank manager was caught laundering £225,000 at a Barclays branch in the city. Heather Smalley, 31, worked at Barclays for 14 years, but she was operating an elaborate money-laundering scheme unknown to her colleagues.

Smalley arranged to take in bags of £10 and £20 notes from an unnamed man who went by the name of 'K' and replaced them with 'clean' £50 banknotes. She did this six times, exchanging between £25,000 and £65,000 in cash per transaction.

Smalley laundered a total of £255,000 between February and October 2020. Barclays Bank’s anti-money laundering policies put a maximum cap of £100 for cash exchanges.

Smalley, 31, was sentenced to two years imprisonment and suspended for two years for entering an arrangement which facilitated the laundering of another person’s criminal proceeds at Warwick Crown Court. Smalley had pleaded guilty to the charge at Coventry Magistrates Court.

Andrew Cant of the Crown Prosecution Service said: “Smalley held a position of responsibility at the bank and, as an experienced manager, she must have known that her actions were contrary to the bank’s money-laundering rules. Her arrangement to exchange massive quantities of cash for the unnamed individual was deeply suspicious.

“This case highlights the importance of ensuring compliance with money-laundering procedures for those who work in the financial services sector.”