Misuse of banking system (By an Accountant)
An accountant employed by an educational institution and another company was alleged to have defrauded these two organisations of approximately US$266,000.
The accountant’s method was to redirect company payments for legitimate invoices to his personal account. When a payment reminder for the invoice was received he organised payment to the creditor. The accountant wrote an invoice for double payment and claimed one payment himself. The accountant also created false invoices/payments to himself from the company.
A credit union lodged a SAR detailing the accountant’s suspicious conduct involving high-value cash and cheque deposits and withdrawals. The basis of the suspicion was that none of the transactions were over 10,000 and the transactional activity did not correspond with the profile of the customer.
The information also detailed the accountant’s use of wire transfers to Country A and Country B. These transactions were between amounts of US$3,600 and US$10,000 and were all conducted through the same bank branch within several days of each other.
Indicators:
- Activity is inconsistent with customer profile
- False invoicing
- Structured deposits clustered over a period of time
- Structured withdrawals clustered over a period of time
- Transactions occurring in a cluster made by the same person
- International wire transfers to countries known to be high risk terrorism financing jurisdictions
The accountant was arrested and ultimately charged with multiple counts of fraud.