Agents of the Dénia National Police have arrested a 36-year-old man who works as a waiter in a well-known restaurant in the city for nine years.
Everything was discovered when at the beginning of 2020 they changed the billing computer system in the restaurant. After using it for five months it was observed that there was a loss of money amounting to almost 100.000 euros. At that time the owners of the establishment made this fact known to the National Police of Dénia.
Thanks to the investigation carried out by the Dénia Local Judicial Police Brigade, it was determined that the missing money had been improperly appropriated by one of the trusted waiters.
The waiter had worked there since 2012 and as of 2016 he was the only person in charge of the company's finances due to the relationship of trust and that the owners had to be absent periodically for medical reasons.
Taking advantage of the trust placed in him, he devised a system to subtract part of the daily collection without being detected by manipulating the seats of the tickets for each service provided and then, on the rest day, when the restaurant was closed, he erased his trace. However, the new computer system exposed all the movements that it carried out.
Since the waiter worked for many years in the restaurant, the investigation determined that he had appropriated more money in previous years. The investigators analyzed the economic records since the detainee took charge of finances in 2016 and thanks to a thorough and methodical analysis it was possible to determine that since that year the same waiter had appropriated almost 840.000 euros.
After being discovered, the detainee admitted the facts and returned the almost 100.000 euros that the new computer system had detected, money that had been appropriated from 2020 until he was fired.
His former co-workers also noticed that, in a few months, since the detainee did not work with them, the money received in tips had increased disproportionately, and it was not possible to determine in this case the economic amount taken.
In the search of the address they found a multitude of luxury products whose market price amounted to approximately 46.500 euros, such as a jacket valued at 8.500 euros, trousers with the label on that cost 1500 euros each, shoes worth 750 euros or computer equipment of high end. They also observed that various luxury renovations had been carried out in their home, such as a television integrated in a dressing room mirror and the installation of a safe, among others.
During the investigation, it was also discovered that he had made trips to destinations such as Las Vegas, Los Angeles, United Arab Emirates, Paris, Argentina and Mexico, not ruling out that he made other trips with stops in other countries. High-value international trips to which he took his loved ones and paid for everything.
Likewise, there was also knowledge of the purchase of a property worth 180.000 euros. A standard of living far removed from that of a person who officially earned less than a thousand euros a month who worked as a waiter.
The detainee was placed at the disposal of the Court of Investigation of the Guard of the same locality.
