Question: An owner of a small company with four long-time and trusted employees has requested your services as a forensic accountant. It is primarily a cash-based business. The owner typically makes deposits, but could not do so one day last week because of a bank holiday.
Instead, the owner kept the money in the business safe. However, $5,000 came up missing from the safe, and there was no sign of a break-in. Below are the profiles for each employee and suspect:
• Employee #1: Henry is a 25-year old who has worked for the company for three years. He is single, religious, and graduated with a degree in marketing. He likes sports.
• Employee #2: Larry is 23 years old and engaged to be married soon. He has worked very hard for the company for six years. He loves to gamble.
• Employee #3: Vivian is a 51-year old widow. She has been with the company for seven years; she comes to work early and leaves late. She has two grown children.
• Employee #4: Sally is 29 years old. She is a divorced mother of two children. She has worked for the company for five years and has accounting knowledge.
You have been asked to investigate the perpetrated fraud, and the police have not yet been contacted. Write a 3- to 5-page paper in MS Word responding to the following questions:
• How would you go about interviewing each employee? In other words, discuss all parameters of the four interviews.
• What questions would you ask each person? As you devise your interviewing/interrogation plan and questions, be sure to take into consideration the fraud triangle and fraud scale that we covered in Week 1.
Ensure that you support your points with at least 3 sources