Other Stuff
The $150m sting ruined by two words
Among the accused … Dallas Fitzgerald, Ernst Hufnagl and Barry Osborne.
By Kate McClymont
March 18, 2006
AS STINGS go, the theft of $150 million from JP Morgan Chase Bank on Christmas
Eve, 2003, was breathtakingly clever, with a plot and cast of characters worthy
of a Hollywood script.
Among the alleged culprits are the son of a Bandidos bikie boss, a Russian-born
Israeli now living in South Africa, a famous Sydney crime figure, a group of
Russians, and a former South African solicitor now working in Australia as a
fraud investigator.
This local version of Ocean's 11 has emerged through legal proceedings in Hong
Kong and in police statements of facts tendered during recent court hearings in
Sydney.
As lunchtime office workers in Sydney's financial district dashed out for
last-minute Christmas shopping, two men made their way to Telstra's phone
exchange in Dalley Street, just round the corner from JP Morgan in George
Street. Barry Osborne, a Telstra technician based in Waverley, used his swipe
card to let in himself and his mate. Once in, police allege, Osborne hotwired
the phone exchange equipment to send a fax to the bank's trades and cash centre
purporting to be from the trustee of the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme,
which controls $5.5 billion of federal public servants' money.
According to court documents, once they had hacked into the line, his mate,
Ernst Hufnagl, then made a follow-up call to confirm the faxed instructions to
transfer $150 million to four overseas bank accounts: two in Hong Kong, one in
Switzerland and one in Greece.
Receiving the call at JP Morgan's end was a Treasury officer, Greg Bourchier,
who police now allege was part of the sting. Despite noticing the fax had
November rather than December on the top, senior staff at JP Morgan approved the
release of $150 million belonging to Commonwealth superannuants before heading
off for Christmas.
According to court proceedings in Hong Kong, it was not until staff returned
from their five-day break on December 29 that they made the sickening discovery
that must have ruined any residual Christmas cheer.
Lying idle for five days was a fax from the Laiki Bank in Greece. Sent at
10.30pm on Christmas Eve, the fax queried the account details for a deposit of
$71.9 million. A "Pty Ltd" had been mistakenly added to a personal bank account.
It was this tiniest of glitches that was to bring the scheme undone.
JP Morgan had had another lucky break. An attempt had been made to transfer the
$26 million out of the Swiss bank account but it had to be done by the account
holder, Richard Kurland, attending Switzerland in person, and he was busy
tucking into Christmas dinner at Leura in the Blue Mountains.
However, a total of $51 million was available from the two Hong Kong accounts,
both of which were connected with casinos.
On December 29, as senior JP Morgan officials were desperately seeking court
orders to freeze the money in the four overseas accounts, Alexandr Roizman, a
Darling Point invalid pensioner, was about to embark on an overnight gambling
jaunt on a gaudy floating casino in Hong Kong Harbour. By the time the ship
Captain Omar III set sail at 8.30 that evening,
$30.4 million was available for collection.
Documents tendered in the High Court of Hong Kong show that police obtained
video surveillance from the vessel that shows Roizman sitting at a gaming table
next to another alleged conspirator, Jian Ping Wang, who left Australia the day
before the alleged sting. Police allege Wang lost about $3.4 million of the
funds at the tables that night.
The following day the pair headed off to the casino at the Lisboa Hotel in Macau
only to find their millions had been frozen. Not only was JP Morgan following
the missing money but the Australian Federal Police were now on the case as
well.
The prison grapevine is second to none in terms of rapidity. "I'd only been in
Parklea jail for a matter of hours before prisoners were banging on my cell
door, asking me if I had a spare million," Greg Bourchier told the Herald this
week.
Last October, Bourchier, 34, who had since left JP Morgan, was arrested. He
spent four miserable days in a water-logged cell before getting bail.
According to the court documents, police claim Bourchier had been assisting the
syndicate by providing internal banking documents. Bourchier denies this.
Earlier, internal faxes relating to specific bank accounts that had Bourchier's
handwriting on them were found in the possession of other syndicate members,
police allege.
While he admits knowing one of the men accused over this matter, Bourchier
described the bizarre situation of being in the back of a prison van with men he
had never met before, but who had been charged over the same matter as he had.
Heading out to Parklea jail last October were Osborne, 44, now suspended from
Telstra on full pay, and Hufnagl, 54, whose sister Ursula, coincidentally, runs
one of Sydney's leading model agencies and had Michelle Leslie, of Bali fame, on
the books.
This week the hard wooden benches that line the back of court at Central Local
in Liverpool Street were filled with men charged over this matter.
Sitting in the front row was the alleged mastermind - a tall, thin, ponytailed
25-year-old, Dallas Fitzgerald, whose father, Felix Lyle, is a chieftain in the
outlaw bikie gang the Bandidos.
It is alleged that all four overseas bank accounts were organised by Fitzgerald
for and on behalf of the crime figure, who cannot be named because he is in jail
awaiting trial on another matter.
Sitting with Fitzgerald were Hufnagl and Osborne, who police allege were
responsible for hacking into Telstra's main frame and sending the fraudulent
faxes. Police also allege it was Hufnagl who was on the phone pretending to be
the authorised signatory to the superannuation account.
Bourchier, who is representing himself, sat alone.
Also in court charged over this matter was a former South African solicitor,
Richard Kurland, 58. A part-time fraud investigator from the Blue Mountains, he
moved to Australia more than 20 years ago and set up Intellectual Property and
Anti-counterfeiting Services. He is alleged to have organised for the syndicate
to use his dormant Swiss bank account.
The Russian-born Roizman, 50, who has leukemia, took up a seat on the back bench
near his friend Leonid Kuris, who is also a mate of Kurland's.
The former secretary-manager of Newtown RSL, Garry Petersen, 52, was also in
court. Petersen, who is a longtime friend of the Bourchier family, is the
alleged link between the crime figure and Bourchier.
While JP Morgan reimbursed the super scheme for any lost funds, it is still
fighting in the Hong Kong courts to recover the $3.4 million gambled away on the
cruise aboard the Captain Omar.
The matter will be back in court in May.