Employer seeks to recover stolen cash but fraudster assets in doubt

FOR a small family business, getting back $3.1 million stolen by an employee would mean the world, but whether it will happen remains unknown.

Down to Earth Demolitions owner Rohan Murphy has filed a civil claim against his former office manager Wendy Aspinall who is serving an 11-year jail sentence for four counts of fraud in the Townsville Women’s Correctional Centre.

He claimed she breached fiduciary duty and duty of care when she swiped the cash over 10 years and gambled it away.

Mr Murphy’s lawyer Doug McKinstry of WGC Lawyers in Cairns said as Aspinall was currently a prisoner, the claim was served on the Office of the Public Trustee of Queensland which manages the estates of those incarcerated.

He said she was not able to defend the claim without their consent and, conversely, they could make certain decisions about her finances, including using her estate to settle debts.

The Cairns Post understands Aspinall and her husband still co-own a small home at the Millstream, near Ravenshoe, on the Tablelands, a property they purchased in 2000 for just $80,000.

Police sources say the property is heavily mortgaged and she has no other major assets.

Mr McKinstry said his client hoped the Public Trustee would “exercise its discretion” and make repayments to him from Ms Aspinall’s estate, but they were not currently aware of the extent of Aspinall’s estate or “whether there is any prospect of recovery”.

He was due to serve the claim on the Public Trustee yesterday.

He said given Ms Aspinall’s plea of guilty: “I believe it is in the interests of all parties that the cost of lengthy court proceedings be avoided particularly in circumstances where there can be no dispute as to Ms Aspinall’s conduct”.

The matter is due to be heard in the Cairns Supreme Court in late January.