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Auckland, December 20, 2108
A Jury found in the Manukau District Court found four persons and an incorporated society guilty of 21 charges of criminal offences relating to misuse of funding from gambling grants derived from Class 4 gambling (‘Pokie Machines’).
The Court heard that Rakesh Chand, Pradeep Chand, Richard Kumar and Vijendra Prasad, had obtained grants on behalf of Shree Sanatan Dharam Prathindhi Sabha Manukau Branch Incorporated and Tavua Cultural and Sports Club Incorporated.
The Charges
The charges related to 11 separate grants and the Gambling Group of the Internal Affairs Department identified the defendants, saying that they had submitted false quotes in order to obtain grant funding, failed to spend grant funding on authorised purposes, failed to return grant funding not spent on authorised purposes, and failed to properly account for the way grant funding was spent, including submitting false invoices and receipts.
The Department’s Director of Gambling Chris Thornborough said, “The Gambling Group works hard to uphold the integrity of the grant application system. We aim to ensure that the community gets the maximum benefit from gambling by detecting and deterring fraudulent activity in gambling-related fundraising.”
Obstruction Offences
Rakesh Chand and Pradeep Chand were found guilty of obstruction offences, after asking individuals they knew would be questioned in the Department’s investigation to lie.
“These defendants misused community money. As regulators we will not accept this type of behaviour,” Mr Thornborough said.
“These convictions show that our team of regulators, investigators, and solicitors can, and will, catch and prosecute individuals who fail to comply with rules around community grants, or attempt to falsify records as these grant recipients did”.
The defendants have been remanded on bail to sentencing on March 14, 2019 at the Manukau District Court.
Source: Department of Internal Affairs, New Zealand.
