Woman jailed for embezzling £86,000 from friend’s cancer charity

A woman who stole nearly £86,000 from a cancer charity set up in memory of her best friend’s daughter has been jailed for three years.

Lindsay MacCallum, 61, defrauded the charity Rainbow Valley over the course of a decade, after launching it with former friend Angela MacVicar.

She also embezzled £9,505 from the Anthony Nolan Trust – a stem cell donation charity.

Speaking outside court, Mrs MacVicar said she was “totally bereft” at the fraud and that MacCallum had “fooled everybody.”

A court heard MacCallum, of Aberfoyle, Perthshire, forged signatures of charity staff and rerouted cash from fundraising accounts for her own use between 2011 and 2021.

She was told by a sheriff she had “systematically and deliberately” perpetrated “calculating” frauds on the third sector organisations, and “betrayed” cancer victims.

Outside court, Mrs MacVicar said: “I think she was sorry she was caught – no mention of being sorry for the devastation she has caused us and Johanna’s memory.

“I was bereft when I found out what she had done, totally bereft. She was my best friend, and I trusted her implicitly, as did everybody.

“She fooled everybody.”

MacCallum worked as a fundraising manager for the Anthony Nolan Trust from 1995 to 2012 before she left to set up Rainbow Valley with Mrs MacVicar.

In 2005, Mrs MacVicar lost her 27-year-old daughter Johanna to leukaemia and the foundation was established in her honour.

The pair worked together for ten years before a fall-out in 2022.

Mrs MacVicar subsequently discovered discrepancies in an account set up for a fundraising ball.

In total MacCallum took £85,978 from Rainbow Valley.

Katie Cunningham, prosecuting, told the court: “The accused sent a message to Mrs MacVicar stating, ‘I’m really sorry Angela. I hate myself, I’m trying to make it right.”

“She said she was ashamed and it was “abhorrent” that she had transferred money from the account into her own.

“The accused said her daughter was in terrible trouble and needed access to money.

“She said that she was finding it difficult to live with herself.”

The court heard that MacCallum was made project development manager of Rainbow Valley and in 2014 was given a charity credit card to replace using a Friends of Rainbow Valley bank account.

But the account remained in use and it was not until August 2022, after a fall out between the friends, that questions were raised over transactions from this account.

MacCallum – a former Royal Navy servicewoman – pleaded guilty to two fraud charges totalling £95,483.

Defence advocate Deirdre Flanagan said MacCallum had already paid back £25,000 of the money taken, was able to repay the rest, and intended to do so.

MacCallum, who appeared at Falkirk Sheriff Court by video link from prison, was told by Sheriff Maryam Labaki that she had “brought devastation” to those who had trusted her.

The sheriff added: “The purpose of the Rainbow Valley charity was to support the families of those suffering from cancer.

“You betrayed those who are suffering, and the terminally ill and their families.

“You deprived them of funds raised in good faith.”