A mother who used to run the Gilbert Institute after-school programme was found guilty yesterday of stealing more than $40,000 from it.

Lee Brown, 49, of St. David's had been on trial since last week for eight charges that related to stealing and forgery between November 2003 and April 2005 in Supreme Court. The mother was in charge of Gilbert Institute's after-school programme when she took $30,893 from various deposits meant for the programme's Bank of Bermuda account.

She was also found guilt by the seven woman, five man jury of stealing more than $10,000 through forging signatures on the programme's cheques. And she was found guilty of six charges of forgery relating to cheques totalling $6,090 where she forged signatures from the co-signees to present them to pay her bills.

Brown showed no emotion as the jury foreman read out each guilty verdict though gasps and small cheers came from the small crowd in the court room.

During her summation yesterday Puisne Judge Charles-Etta Simmons said many of the checks and balances used to manage the after-school accounts seem to have been eliminated when Brown ran the programme.

Brown, who was a volunteer in her leadership role, took-on the responsibility of depositing the programme's as well as keeping the cheque book — both roles had been done by two different people in the past.

The after-school service had been started by the PTA in 2001 with a $2,000 donation and had become so successful that two years later it had paid the loan back. But during the time Brown was in this position began struggling to pay the staff members.

Mrs. Justice Simmons what had not changed was that Christine Place, the administrative assistant continued to 'meticulously' keep the receipt book and prepared the deposits for the programme.

During the investigation into the missing funds for the programme, however, Ms. Place identified cheques she had not signed deducting money from the programme's accounts.Brenda Smith, the only other person who could have cosigned the cheques and the other coordinator of the programme, also identified after-school cheques that were apparently signed by her to Brown.Brown, however, argued that many of her signatures on the cheques, except those with her address or driver's license on them, had not been written by her.That, Mrs. Justice Simmons said, draws in the evidence given by the handwriting expert who said the signatures of Ms Place and Ms Smith on the questionable cheques were not theirs.He had, however, not looked at Brown's signature to match it against the cheques she claimed she had not written the questionable cheques, however, had been made out to Brown. The defence claimed that someone had been forging Brown's signature and receipts written by her during a period she would have been in the hospital could prove that.Larry Scott, Brown's lawyer, also argued yesterday that the Police's investigation could have had a greater scope to ensure his client was not the one whose signature was being forged.However, after less than two hours the jury returned a unanimous guilty verdict on all eight count.Brown was remanded in custody until the August arraignments' session.Mr. Scott, following the decision said: "We are very disappointed. My client maintains she didn't do it."