Home detention for Chch company director who defrauded ACC

6 December 2013

Home detention for Christchurch company director who defrauded ACC

Brian Arthur Skinley, a 56-year-old Christchurch company director, has been sentenced to five and a half months’ home detention in the Christchurch District Court after pleading guilty to defrauding ACC.

Skinley, who appeared for sentencing on Wednesday, 4 December, was convicted of one representative charge of dishonestly using a document under the Crimes Act.

He was also ordered to pay reparation of $41,212.66.

Skinley’s offending related to a period of three years and five months between August 2007 and January 2011, during which he received undisclosed income of $157,523while in receipt of ACC weekly compensation for a back injury.

Throughout the period of offending, Skinley sent numerous declarations to ACC stating that he was aware of his responsibility to tell ACC if he received any income.

During interviews with ACC in September 2007 and April 2009, Skinley explicitly told staff that he was not receiving any income. He was contacted again in January 2011, and eventually admitted that he’d been receiving $300 a week from “day one”. However, subsequent enquires by ACC investigators revealed that his undisclosed income was considerably more than this, and was as high as $57,900 in 2009.

ACC’s General Manager of Claims Management, Sid Miller, says “Kiwis pay levies to ACC to help people in genuine need of injury-related support, so it’s disappointing when people deliberately abuse the Scheme.

“ACC has an Investigations Unit which follows up all information that suggests possible fraudulent activity, and takes appropriate action when criminal offending is identified.”

ENDS

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