Ex-Ipswich CEO Carl Wulff behind bars over $240k in corrupt payments
IPSWICH council’s former top bureaucrat Carl Wulff was on Thursday night in the watch-house after being convicted of pocketing $241,000 in corrupt payments.
Crime & Justice
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IPSWICH council’s former top bureaucrat Carl Wulff was on Thursday night in the watch-house after being convicted of pocketing $241,000 in corrupt payments.
Wulff, 66, will spend Christmas in custody pending sentencing in February.
He is the first scalp in the anti-corruption watchdog’s wide-ranging probe into Ipswich council that also led to charges being laid against two former mayors.
Others netted in the wide ranging Crime and Corruption Commission to be convicted of official corruption in Brisbane’s District Court yesterday included Wulff’s wife of 18 years Sharon Oxenbridge, 51, business veteran Wayne Myers, 64, and Ipswich council contractor Claude Walker, 61.
Oxenbridge was yesterday seen crying into a tissue beside her husband in the dock as her defence barrister pleaded for leniency in her sentence, arguing she had been forced to quit her job in the wake of the charges and had that the corrupt payments were instigated by Wulff and not by her.
The former Civil Aviation Safety Authority worker left the court alone after Wulff was taking straight to the watch-house.
Prosecutors have asked for no less than 6 years jail time for Wulff.
Myers, Oxenbridge and Walker were bailed pending sentencing in February.
Brisbane’s District Court yesterday heard of two separate “sophisticated” schemes in which $241,000 in payments were funnelled to Wulff.
In one scheme, a sham contract deal was set up to disguise corrupt payments made to Wulff and his wife by Victorian-based contractor Claude Walker.
Wulff and Walker first met in 2003 when Wulff was the CEO of Dandenong council. In May 2012, when Wulff was CEO at Ipswich, Walker’s company won a council contract for recovery work after the 2011 floods.
He also took out a 10 per cent share in Wulff’s swanky Hamilton apartment and moved in, with ratepayers funding $80,000 in rent payments.
The court was told that months before the contract was signed, Walker met Wulff twice, each time handing him an envelope containing $2500.
A further 18 separate electronic fund transfers totalling $99,000 were later made by Wulff to Oxenbridge’s company Bojangles in 2012 and 2013.
The payments were “camouflaged” by Oxenbridge being hired as a consultant, but she “did not render any services for these payments nor was it expected,” the court heard.
“It was sophisticated in the sense that he utilised the company structure to camouflage those payments,” prosecutor Sam Bain told the court.
A false contract was also signed to funnel money to Bojangles over a separate fill services agreement with contractor Wayne Innes, the court was told.
Wulff benefited from $115,000 in corrupt payments funnelled to him under that deal through a company owned by Myers.
Myers was a consultant and former lobbyist with top level business and political connections.
He met Innes at a business conference in Thailand in about 2010 and had Ipswich connections through a decade-long friendship with former mayor Paul Pisasale, who is battling unrelated charges.
Myers set up a meeting between Innes and Wulff, and Myers struck a deal with Innes for a 30 per cent cut of profits from work he got with Ipswich council.
Wulff later drew up a council contract for a fill services agreement.
“Mr Myers said this is a huge opportunity and Innes will pay me big time if I can be seen to get any work with (council),” Mr Bain told the court.
Myers invoiced Innes for work and then funnelled corrupt payments to Wulff.
Wulff received a total $115,000 through Myers’ company and also had a $7000 deck paid for by Innes and a $15,000 cash payment.
Mr Bain said Wulff had committed an “egregious breach” of his council duties.
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