A COMPANY director who sold stolen Hotpoint domestic appliances for eight years was yesterday jailed for 18 months.

Paisley Sheriff Court had heard how Hotpoint lost hundreds of goods when employees found a way to steal from under the noses of supervisors.

Roderick Dunlop, owner of Domestic Services (Scotland), in Dumbarton Road, Glasgow, was found guilty of resetting stolen Hotpoint appliances between 1985 and 1993.

The thefts from the company went on for around 20 years, the court was told, until a newly appointed manager who once served as a Glasgow policeman suspected something was wrong.

Two employees at Hotpoint's Renfrew depot in Blythswood Industrial Estate operated their lucrative sideline through a go-between electrical dealer who died three years ago.

Fake forms requesting replacement machines for dissatisfied customers were used.

Depot manager Alexander McEwan applied his police experience after he noticed that washing machines and fridge freezers were appearing from nowehere then disappearing overnight.

He began to note serial numbers and took photographic records.

He said it was normal practice for faulty machines to be replaced by new units delivered direct to customers' homes but the fake appliance requisition forms gave each false customer's address as c/o the Blythswood service depot. The letter F was entered in a box to indicate the machine was to be supplied free of charge.

The jury was told how two managers were dismissed and subsequently appeared in court last August to plead guilty to theft of goods between 1990 and 1992.

George Elder, 58, and Robert Mooney, 52, had fines totalling #3500 imposed after they had paid back #37,000 to the company - the manufacturing cost of the appliances involved.

The jury heard that Dunlop, 45, of Gartconnel Road, Bearsden, Glasgow, had a long-standing relationship with the go-between dealer, James Henighen, who supplied him with Hotpoint machines cheaper than the company price.

Then, in 1992, when police announced they were investigating thefts from Hotpoint's service depot, Henighen wanted to clear his conscience and made a death-bed confession to his son in which he admitted he had ``many illegal dealings'' obtaining appliances and spares from Hotpoint employees over a period of 20 years.

A letter was dictated to Henighen's son and signed by his father in the presence of the family solicitor.

When Dunlop appeared for sentence yesterday, Sheriff Neil Douglas was handed a letter from Bearsden Ski Club outlining the accused's ``long and distinguished service'' to the club.

However, the sheriff said a prison sentence was the only possible disposal. He said the difference between the accused's case and that of Elder and Mooney was that he had been found guilty of resetting goods ``worth tens of thousands of pounds'' over eight years compared to the relatively short period involving the two men.