Charlene Ashby Clay, 24, pleaded guilty to two charges of criminal breach of trust (CBT) and one of transferring benefits from criminal conduct, Channel News Asia (CNA) reported.

Clay had been siphoning money from the clinic since October 2018. By March the following year, she had pocketed S$44,861 (RM138,626), by manipulating the data in the point of sale (POS) system.

However, she admitted to her crime after the clinic’s accountant informed her employer of a discrepancy between the amount received by the clinic and the point of sale system logs.

Clay then begged for a second chance and promised to pay the dentist back by having her salary deducted.

Despite this, she misappropriated another S$113,520 in cash from patients between March 2019 and March 2020.

Clay did so by offering unauthorised discounts to patients to transfer their dental fees into her personal bank account.

Her scam was discovered after the dentist told a patient to pay for a procedure. It was then that the patient informed that she had already made a full payment to Clay previously.

Clay confessed again after being confronted by the dentist, who subsequently lodged a police report.

Clay transferred some of her ill-gotten gains to a bank account in Malaysia and spent the rest on herself, including for the purchase of a property in Malaysia, according to CNA.