Joel Smith McCorkindale on 200 charges of fraud and dishonesty

A man has been charged with 70 counts of fraud, 81 counts of identity theft, 18 counts of forgery, one charge of attempted fraud in relation to selling property worth up to $100,000, and 18 counts of using a forged document.

Joel Smith McCorkindale has been charged with more than 200 offences.

A Gold Coast man facing more than 200 charges, mostly relating to fraud and dishonesty from about 100 alleged victims, had his matter discussed in a South Burnett court on Friday.

Joel Smith McCorkindale is currently on bail with strict conditions, including wearing an ankle monitor, and has been charged with more than 230 offences, the bulk involving alleged dishonesty offences.

The 29-year-old didn’t appear in court but was represented by lawyer Lisa Searing from Allen and Searing Criminal Lawyers who appeared via telephone.

His charges included 70 counts of fraud, 81 counts of obtaining another person’s identification for the purpose of committing fraud, 18 counts of forgery, one charge of attempted fraud in relation to the delivery of property worth between $30,000 and $100,000 and 18 counts of using a forged document.

Police prosecutor Barry Stevens told the court the total amount allegedly defrauded was more than $100,000.

“There are about 100 odd complainants,” Sergeant Stevens said.

He said about 15 to 20 charges may be dropped as the arresting officer had not been able to obtain a statement from at least one of the alleged victims.

“We supplied a number of additional statements this week. The arresting officers are of the belief that there might be a couple more trickle in,” Sgt Stevens said.

As magistrate Andrew Sinclair looked into Mr McCorkindale’s files, Sgt Stevens explained what was in them.

“The list of the victims … there’s statements, there’s Gumtree messages, there are bank accounts, emails and the like,” Sgt Stevens said.

Joel Smith McCorkindale has been charged with more than 200 offences.

Ms Searing said she had been inundated with documents in the days leading up to Friday’s hearing.

“I was provided with 15 complainant statements late yesterday, I’m going through those now,” she said.

“My client has instructed me, blanket instructions, where if I think there’s enough evidence that there will be a plea.

“There’s still 31 complainant statements that are outstanding. The ones that were disclosed yesterday, all but four of them were taken between 3rd of January this year the 8th of February this year, so they’ve only recently been taken.

“I’m not sure about how many emails came through yesterday but there was a large number of them and there are a large number of documents that I need to print and cross reference.

“I think I’m going to need about four weeks to go through it all and put it together,” Ms Searing said.

Mr Sinclair gave both parties more than a month to have everything ready for a hand-up committal hearing.

“I will list the matter up for a full hand up in something like six weeks and a plea to anything that’s not going up.

“If there’s not sufficient evidence by six weeks’ time, the charges disappear,” he said.

A full hand up committal is a proceeding where the magistrate receives the brief of evidence from the prosecution and will make a decision to commit the matter to a higher court.

The next hearing will be on April 19, 2024.