Treasurer stole club cash to pay for lifestyle

Clifford Caddick enjoyed drinking and gambling with the affluent crowd he met through the West Yorkshire Sports and Social Club in Wakefield, but they earned more than he did.

Eventually he “succumbed to temptation” and began to use club funds to pay his way, his lawyer John Wilkinson told Leeds Crown Court yesterday.

By the time his dishonesty was uncovered more than £42,000 was missing and Caddick was also deeply in debt.

Caddick, 49, of Regent Street, Belle Vue, Wakefield, was jailed for 10 months after admitting three charges of fraud and one of possessing criminal property.

Judge Kerry Macgill told him people had put their trust in him and he had systematically abused it. “This was out and out lining your own pockets to fund a lifestyle you couldn’t afford.”

The money was taken not for some desperate need but “just to live above your lifestyle socialising with people who had more”.

His had been a spectacular fall from grace, losing his home and employment while ending up £170,000 in debt.

The judge added: “It is a very sad day to see somebody having to go to prison like this but you dipped your hands into the club’s money and have to pay the price for it.”

David Orbaum, prosecuting, said Caddick was treasurer from 1998 to 2008 when the financial problems came to light.

A new treasurer investigated the club’s accounts and discovered from 2006 Caddick had been dishonest in two different ways.

The first involved siphoning money from a lottery fund and the other paying invoices twice, the second time with money into his own account.

When police investigated they found he had debts of £170,000 with negative equity in his home.

Mr Wilkinson said Caddick had recently been living in a single room in a rented flat.