The former chief financial officer of failed childcare company ABC Learning Centres has escaped jail over his role in concealing more than $46 million from shareholders.
James Black, 46, was handed 18 months' jail but immediately released on a $2000, two-year good behaviour bond on Tuesday for helping mislead an auditor of the former childcare group.
He was sentenced in the Brisbane District Court after earlier pleading guilty to making available false and misleading information to the auditor.
The sentence comes six years after the investigation into ABC Learning began, following the childcare giant's 2008 collapse with debts up to $2.7 billion.
Now the chief financial officer at mining company QCoal, Black admitted authorising or permitting two false "engagement letters" to the auditor.
They were used to justify payments of $13.5 million and $33 million by ABC Learning to an unrelated company named ABC Acquisitions in December 2006.
The payments purported to be for services related to ABC Learning's purchase of childcare centre chains in the United States and United Kingdom.
However ABC Acquisitions, a private company, wasn't involved in acquiring the companies, nor engaged to provide the services it was paid for.
Judge Anthony Rafter said Black had been acting on instructions by former ABC Learning chief executive Eddy Groves.
The letters resulted in the concealment of $46.5 million which would otherwise have been accounted for differently in ABC Learning Centres' accounts, he added.
"You were not the architect of the offence but your participation was necessary," Justice Rafter told Black. "You occupied a position of trust.
"The board, shareholders and the market more generally depended on you discharging your duties with integrity.
"You failed dismally."
The conviction automatically disqualifies the father of three from managing a corporation.
In 2012, former ABC Learning director Martin Kemp was acquitted of dishonesty charges relating to his position, and charges against Groves were subsequently dropped.
Share
