Accountants disagree over cash source

‘‘We are not talking about a massive amount of money. There are a lot of businesses conducted in cash.’’

Nick den Heijer

Chartered accountant

Doubt has been thrown on an accounting exercise designed to try to show a Hells Angels member was making money through drug dealing.

Chartered accountant Nick den Heijer told a jury yesterday the cash could have come from firewood, breeding french bulldogs and boarders.

The accounting exercise was done to try to show the true source of Andrew Sisson’s funds.

He is on trial in the Palmerston North District Court, accused of being part of a methamphetamine supply ring in 2020.

Sisson, a Hells Angels member, allegedly supplied Palmerston North-based Hells Angels member and drug dealer Daron Ian Charles Gilmore, who has already pleaded guilty to various charges.

Gilmore then distributed to a network of dealers, with many of them pleading guilty before trial.

Another man, Scott James Allan, is also on trial, accused of cooking meth for Gilmore once the first Covid-19 lockdown made sourcing the product difficult.

All parties were arrested after the execution of Operation Buckle, a police investigation targeting alleged meth dealing by the Hells Angels in Manawatū and surrounding areas.

Sisson’s finances have been under scrutiny throughout the trial, with the Crown saying his spending habits showed he needed significant amounts of cash to cover his bills.

Accountant Ashna Achari went through his accounts and told the trial there was a $120,000 hole between Sisson’s and his partner’s bank account activity and the average spend of an Auckland couple with two children between 2013 and 2020.

Sisson, who gave evidence, said he and his partner made cash from having boarders, selling firewood and breeding french bulldogs, which he described as ‘‘our little babies’’.

But den Heijer told the jury yesterday Achari’s forensic accounting exercise was flawed.

First, he was sent an email late on Tuesday showing the shortfall had been changed to $62,000, on the basis of Sisson’s children moving out of home.

When averaged out, it was a shortfall of $170 per week.

Second, Achari did not take into account sources of money like the puppies and firewood, den Heijer said.

He was given evidence those sources existed, including pictures of wood and puppies and evidence of insemination fees, which he then used with other research to try to verify how much money Sisson could have made.

He found there could have been $211,000 of legitimate cash revenue between 2013 and 2020.

‘‘We are not talking about a massive amount of money.

‘‘There are a lot of businesses conducted in cash.’’

It was not weird for people to pay cash for firewood and dogs.

Third, Achari did not get bank records that showed Sisson’s partner received $86,000 in inheritance payments, den Heijer said.

Given the shortfall of $170, it made no sense not to consider the fact Sisson made up that shortfall and more through cash-based means. That was even before the fact Sisson lived on a lifestyle block with cattle used for homekill was taken into account, den Heijer said.

He agreed when asked by Crown prosecutor Deborah Davies he had a brief to analyse Achari’s exercise.

But he pushed back when told he had only come up with potential sources of cash, saying his research backed up his figures.

‘‘We can’t say exactly how much cash, but in my line of work I ... look to verify what I have been told. That’s what I have done here.’’ The trial continues, with Allan giving evidence from this morning.