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Chris Skelton / Stuff
Joanne Harrison was deported more than a year ago, but was unable to take the funds from KiwiSaver. (File photo)
Police are still trying to stop the Transportation Ministry scammer, Joanne Harrison, who collects $ 23,000 collected from her KiwiSaver account.
Harrison was deported back to the UK more than a year ago and asked to be paid some of her KiwiSaver funds for financial hardship.
But police say the claim was dishonest, and that it was always part of their plan to try to unlock her KiwiSaver so she could pay off the family loans and retrain once she was released from prison.
She is fighting to have the $ 23,000 transferred to her. She said the police had already recovered all the assets they could under the $ 784,172 criminal income recovery order made against her.
READ MORE:
* Police chase scammer Joanne Harrison by the thousands on KiwiSaver holdings
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* Fraud Joanne Harrison changed home ownership when the fraud came to light
* Police frozen $ 23,000 KiwiSaver fund transfer from Fraudster Joanne Harrison
That left $ 237,704.50 unpaid, but then the police struck a deal with a woman who received money as a result of the Harrison fraud, who would pay $ 75,000, leaving a deficit of $ 162,704.50.
The woman’s name was removed at the time of the settlement in August 2018, and no criminal charges were filed against her.
Harrison only found out about the deal later and his lawyer says he was misled, but a lawyer for the Police Commissioner said in Wellington Superior Court on Wednesday that the information was released to Harrison’s lawyer, though some time later.
Simon O’Connor / Things
Joanne Harrison is being represented by Nathan Bourke.
Harrison’s attorney Nathan Bourke said Harrison accepted that she caused the loss of $ 726,000 to the ministry, but that only $ 576,000 went to her and $ 150,000 to the other woman.
Had he known that the Commissioner was also taking action against someone else to recover money, Harrison could have tried to reduce her recoverable maximum, instead of allowing the police to “double down” and potentially get more of the loss caused.
He also noted that Harrison’s legal fees also came from everything recovered from her.
For the police, Andrew Britton said Harrison’s request to his KiwiSaver provider to release some of his savings of more than $ 110,000 due to hardship was dishonest, and the Police Commissioner wanted to recover the debt to the people of New Zealand.
The $ 23,000 is withheld pending a decision on whether to lose the Crown or to pay Harrison.
But Bourke and Esther Watt, a lawyer who attends the court, said the money was still KiwiSaver funds and that she would not become Harrison until she was paid.
A judge previously ruled that his KiwiSaver funds could not be decrypted to pay for the stolen money.
Watt and Bourke also argued that the police only recovered the assets mentioned in the court order that had already been issued, and that it did not include any part of the KiwiSaver money.
Harrison, also known as Joanne Sharp, took over $ 720,000 for about three years while she was manager of the Ministry of Transportation.
She was deported in January 2019, after being released on parole for three years and seven months in prison.
Judge Cheryl Gwyn reserved her decision.
