Ian Bentley introduced Darren Park, who is a solicitor, chartered accountant and forensic accountant, who has spent 25 years assisting clients with accountancy problems and fraud.
Ian knew Darren Park as a pupil and Dux of Commerce at Carey Grammar School, long before he set up Pathfinders, a company that deals with legal and accounting problems. Darren was a Rotaract member before becoming a Rotarian.
Darren’s talk covered how a forensic investigator catches a person committing fraud, and the warning signs that may lead to exposure. He revealed some techniques used to detect misconduct and analyse information, and what happens after the evidence has been collated.
Darren’s first example, “to catch two thieves” described how a manager in Paris had seen one of Darren’s presentations, and suspected his General Managers of France and Europe of financial misuse. Investigations then revealed extensive misuse of credit cards, false invoices, claims for entertainment expenses and holidays amounting to thousands of Euros. This led to the sacking of the two managers.
Similar fraud involving the NAB CEO’s Chief of Staff and the Human Group revealed false invoices and kickbacks from suppliers for 7 to 9 million dollars. Helen Rosamund and Helen Rogers had spent up on property, cars and holidays before investigators revealed the extent of their fraud. Rogers pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 8 years imprisonment, but Rosamund pleaded not guilty. After an extensive trial she was found to be guilty and sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Darren then spent some time giving us some tips:
1) What is fraud? - This includes offences against companies and individuals
2) How to combat it - by having strong financial and IT controls, and full training of employees.
3) Red flags - things that arouse suspicion, such as employees who don’t take leave in case their activities are uncovered while they are away, changed behaviour, gambling etc.
4) What to do when fraud is suspected - plan carefully to gather data and stop the suspected person’s access to financial matters.
5) Forensic tools for investigation fraud - surveillance and analysis of accounts and documents can lead to the truth being revealed.
Questions from the Zoom audience: The psyche of fraudsters: many different types of personalities can be involved.
The size of the problem? It may be much larger that suspected, as companies who discover fraud in their business frequently keep quiet about it.
Do perpetrators often dob in others? Maybe: no figures are available on this.
International fraudsters may occasionally be caught with the assistance of Banks or Federal Police.
Chairman-of-the-day Ian Bentley thanked his former pupil for an intriguing presentation.
As his talk contained substantial intellectual property, we do not reproduce any photos or slides etc. - Ed.