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Auckland director gets home detention for wage subsidy fraud
Brief
An Auckland company director has been sentenced to four months home detention after being found guilty of dishonestly obtaining $18,259.20 in COVID-19 wage subsidy payments.
In-depth
The Auckland District Court heard that Musabayoufu Fuati, also known as Alex Fu, was the sole director of TRIPNZ Group Ltd, formerly Wanda New Zealand Ltd, and was convicted of one charge of dishonestly using a document.
The court found that Fuati submitted a wage subsidy application in April 2020 listing himself and two others as employees, even though the company was not trading and none of the named individuals were eligible for support.
The Crown case was that the approved subsidy was not used for wage payments as required. Instead, the funds were transferred into a personal bank account and then moved on to other accounts.
Judge William Lawson said Fuati’s culpability was high, describing the offending as stealing from the community and saying he knew he had no right to the funds. MSD said 59 people have now been sentenced in wage subsidy cases, with 47 others still before the courts.
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