Failed property developer and insurance broker Marcus Julian Friedlander (58) has been sentenced to seven month’s home detention at the Auckland High Court.
Friedlander pleaded guilty to creating a false debt to avoid bankruptcy, with the assistance of associate Ralph Vuletic (31) in August.
Friedlander had a failing property development and insurance brokering businesses and was in debt to the tune of more than $10 million. He formulated a scheme to attempt to avoid bankruptcy by creating a false debt and fraudulent paper trail.
Vuletic, a budding property developer whose family owned valuable sections of land in Auckland, pleaded guilty in October and was sentenced to nine month’s home detention.
The Serious Fraud Office brought charges against the pair under the Crimes Act in January 2011.
They faced 25 charges under the Crimes Act of attempting to pervert the course of justice, using a document for the purpose of obtaining pecuniary advantage and uttering a forged document.
SFO acting chief executive Simon McArley said Friedlander and Vuletic had executed an elaborate scheme to avoid Friedlander's bankruptcy and short change his creditors.
The guilty pleas marked the end of nine-and-a-half-year investigation and prosecution for the SFO and would go some way to restoring confidence in fairness of the insolvency regime, he says.
gbond@nbr.co.nz
Georgina Bond
Mon, 17 Dec 2012
Mon, 17 Dec 2012
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Failed property developer Friedlander sentenced for fraud
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