An Australian lawyer who stole millions from a high-profile client of his to bet on a New Zealand rugby match has received an imprisonment sentence.
Today, Brody Clarke who illegally obtained AU$9.853 million from Bruce Gordon, a media magnate who was one of the most sustainable clients of the law firm he worked in, over the period from December 2015 to September 2017, was sent to jail for six years with a non-parole period of three years by the Downing Centre District Court.
The judge who read the verdict described the offence as “particularly serious” but still expressed hopes that Mr Clarke would be able to bring his rehabilitation to end, saying it was unlikely for him to commit another offence.
As the court heard, in August and September 2017, the 36-year-old lawyer managed to use the mobile phone of a colleague of his and provided that phone number to Deutsche Bank. The latter was at the time holding more than AU$68 million of Birketu Pty Ltd, a private company owned by Mr Gordon.
Clarke also lied to the bank that was the number of Mr Gordon’s son Andrew who was at the time heading his father’s companies and pretended to be him to make the bank release an amount of AU$6.95 million.
More money was transferred to the lawyer’s bank account after he made claims that it was his firm’s trust account. In fact, there have been no such account.
The Fraud Continued for 2 Years and Was Abuse of Position of Trust
The fraudulent scheme was unravelled on September 28th, 2017, when the CFO of Mr Gordon’s companies noticed inconsistency in the accounts and initiated further investigation about that.
That day, Brody Clarke reached George Thomas, a barrister who he was acquainted with, and made a confession about his wrongdoings at a courthouse.
At the hearing on Wednesday, Mr Clarke did not manage to explain what he committed the fraud. However, it became clear that an estimated amount of AU$100 million was spent by the lawyer with the local betting operators Sportsbet and TAB in the period from 2015 and 2017. The court heard that Clarke made quite a few high-scale bets, including an AU$1.5-million wager placed on an NRL game between the Cowboys and Roosters, an AU$1.2-million bet placed on two American football games, as well as an AU$1-million wager on a rugby game in New Zealand
As revealed at the court hearing, the last few days of Mr Clarke’s offending saw him betting an average of more than AU$3 million on a daily basis on football games worldwide.
The lawyer admitted that he had very little knowledge of the games or the leagues they played in and added that he did not make research before placing the above-mentioned bets. Apart from the signs of problem gambling at the time, Clarke was dealing with a bipolar disorder which was not diagnosed and treated at the time of the wrongdoing and used alcohol and drugs. He was earning AU$225,000 on an annual basis plus bonuses while working as a lawyer but was unable to manage his finances properly.
- Author
Daniel Williams
