After setting up a special purpose company to circumvent bank bans on facilitation of foreign exchange transfers, Hamilton-based Worldclear is chasing an employee alleged to have decamped with $4.6 million.
Worldclear alleges employee Richard Whitham skipped the country after cleaning out funds held on its behalf by T1 Holdings Ltd and then blocking online access. T1 Holdings was set up by Worldclear to channel foreign exchange transactions through New Zealand banks after banks stopped acting for financial service providers like Worldclear claiming they might unknowingly implicate banks in money laundering.
Worldclear CEO David Hillary told the High Court T1 Holdings was set up in late 2017. Mr Whitlam fronted as owner of T1 Holdings while still employed by Worldclear. Together with other Worldclear employees, he was authorised to facilitate Worldclear’s foreign exchange transfers through T1 Holdings. Mr Hillary was to later learn that instructions to have all T1 transactions authorised by two signatories were never implemented. Mr Whitlam alone could approve transactions.
Last May, Mr Whitlam failed to turn up to work. Worldclear staff found access to T1 bank accounts had been blocked. Worldclear contacted banks holding T1 accounts; funds had been transferred on Mr Whitlam’s instructions to his own personal account. Panic ensued. Frantic attempts to find Mr Whitlam’s whereabouts identified he had not been living at his given address for the previous three months. Police advised he had left the country at 1.30 pm that day. Worldclear’s dropbox account was subsequently accessed from Singapore. Files relating to Mr Whitlam’s employment and T1 activities were deleted.
Five days later, the High Court imposed freezing orders on all assets Mr Whitlam may still have in New Zealand. The High Court has now appointed Roger Sanderson and Ian McLennan from insolvency specialists McDonald Vague as interim liquidators to take control of T1 Holdings.
Worldclear Ltd v. T1 Holdings Ltd – High Court (29.05.18)
18.118