Charges laid against directors of failed Gisborne finance company

The Serious Fraud Office has laid 92 criminal charges against the three directors of failed Gisborne finance company Rockforte Finance.

Nigel Brent O’Leary and Colin Mark Simpson each face 34 charges, and John Patrick Gardner faces 24 charges under the Crimes Act. 

The alleged offences include theft by a person in a special relationship, false accounting, obtaining by deception, and false statements by a promoter. The charges carry maximum sentences of between seven and ten years imprisonment.

SFO chief executive Adam Feeley said the case was the penultimate finance company investigation to be concluded by the SFO, with only Hanover Finance still under investigation.

Rockforte collapsed into receivership triggering a $4 million payout to investors under the Crown Retail Deposit Guarantee Scheme. 

According to a receivers report of Rockforte Finance by Denis Parsons and Katherine Kenealy of Indepth Forensic, likely recoveries have been slashed from the earlier estimate of 10c to less than 5c in the dollar.

Rockforte had 77 investors owed $3.25 million in debentures, but receivers also found other investors had put $610,000 into the company but these funds “appear to have been transferred to third parties without their consent.”

Under the terms of the Guarantee Scheme Treasury paid out a total of $3.87 million to investors

Receivers noted that of the 318 loans made by the company, mainly secured over second-hand Japanese imported cars, more than 10% of the loan files could not be located. Nondisclosed related party loans totaling nearly $2 million were also uncovered.

Rockforte’s accounts also appear to have been massaged, with receivers reporting non-performing loans were regularly refinanced into new loans and then classed as a current liability, reducing impairment provisioning.

“In some instances this refinancing took placed immediately prior to receivership,” the receivers reports said.

The Financial Markets Authority announced last week it had referred its investigation of Rockforte back to the Serious Fraud Office to prosecute.

“Officers form the Serious Fraud Office have reviewed all records held by the receivers and have made wider enquiries, however we are not aware of any charges being laid in this stage,” the reports said.