JFT CONSTRUCTIONS PTY LTD v WELLS [1994] NSWCA 156

JFT CONSTRUCTIONS PTY LTD v WELLS

SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COURT OF APPEAL

MAHONEY JA 8 April 1994

[1994] NSWCA 156 Mahoney JA

MOTION

This application comes before the Court this afternoon at 4.15pm. It is an application ex-parte in the sense that an endeavour has been made to serve the respondent, the defendant, but that effort has been unsuccessful. Mr Martin, for the company, the claimant and/or plaintiff, seeks relief in the absence of the defendant.

The relief sought arises in the following circumstances: I take the facts from what has been told to me by Mr Martin on the basis of material which has been placed before Giles J on a previous application.

It is said that the defendant Kerry Lucardu Wells, was an employee of JFT Constructions Pty Ltd. It is said that over a period of time from August 1993 until April 1994 he committed frauds upon the company and that it is believed that an amount of some $300,000 has been wrongly obtained from the company by Mr Wells.

The company, it is said, became suspicious of untoward happenings somewhere about 24 or 25 March last. On 6 April 1994, Mr Wells was arrested in the course, or in the context, of an attempt to commit a further fraud. He has been charged with various frauds and is held in custody pending the matters being dealt with. I am told he was granted bail in the sum of $10,000 cash, but that that cash has not yet been lodged and he is at present in Long Bay Gaol.

It is said that he has had previous convictions, or a conviction, for fraud. There is no evidence as to where the money, which it is said that he has obtained, now is. The only evidence of an asset available to be executed upon, if the money were to be repaid by him, is a home of which he is a co-owner at Baulkham Hills. The property, it is said, is subject to a mortgage with the State Bank of New South Wales.