Lawyer diverted Commonwealth money into his bank account

A LAWYER defrauded the Commonwealth out of £140,000 by diverting money from the Cook Islands into his own bank account, a court has heard.

Joshua Brien, 48, worked for 12 years at the Commonwealth Secretariat and was able to steal money while there because basic anti-fraud checks were not carried out routinely.

Brien, from Notting Hill, denied any wrongdoing at Southwark Crown Court where he was convicted on all counts and will be sentenced today.

James Norman, prosecuting, told the court that Brien had diverted fees due to be paid to a consultant, Phil Simmonds, into his own bank account. “He understood how the system worked and he manipulated it to steal quite a lot of money,” said Mr Norman.

“He replaced the bank details held on the Commonwealth Secretariat system for Mr Simmonds for his own.”

The court heard that he sent emails to

colleagues in an attempt to chase the fees for Mr Simmonds, and created an email address to pretend to be the consultant. Mr Norman said: “Up to April 2016, the accounts department wasn’t checking with suppliers whether the amendment being requested was real.”

This fraud was revealed in 2018, after Brien was sacked for an unrelated breach. After leaving the organisation, he became a special counsel at Cooley, an American law firm, who he did not inform of the reasons for his dismissal.

He then went on to steal £403,000 that should have been paid to Cooley by two clients, as well as £90,000 from the Government of the Maldives.

Brien’s wife, Melissa Khemani, who worked at the Commonwealth Secretariat as an anti-corruption specialist, was cleared of a money laundering allegation in January after denying any wrongdoing. Brien, a dual Canadianaustralian citizen, was found guilty of three counts of fraud.