Bipin Thapa: Sydney man sentenced for role in mega money laundering scheme

A western Sydney man has faced the music for his role in a complex international money laundering syndicate which operated out of a well-known security business at which he worked.

A former employee of a security company that fronted a mega $100m money laundering scheme has learned his fate.

Auburn man, 32-year-old Bipin Thapa, earlier pleaded guilty in Sydney’s Downing Centre District Court to two charges of dealing with proceeds of crime worth more than $100,000 as well as receive suspected proceeds of crime worth more than $100,000.

Thapa began as a legitimate employee of the security company and was at the lowest end of the money laundering hierarchy, the court earlier heard.

When giving evidence, Thapa’s wife told the court she suffered depression and anxiety because the charges against her husband meant the couple could not access their bank to repay their $500,000 mortgage.

She said she had to pause her registered nursing studies because she had to surrender her passport for Thapa’s bail conditions and could not do her English test.

Bipin Thapa was sentenced for his role in the fraud. Picture: Facebook

The court heard Thapa was recruited by other players in the huge money laundering ring.

He was sentenced to an aggregate term of imprisonment of 24 months, starting June 7 2022 expiring June 6, 2024.

Judge Ian McClintock said the term was to be served by way of intensive correction in the community.

Other players to be sentenced later this week include 33-year-old Gopali Dahl, 34-year-old Manminder Singh and ringleader, 46-year-old Firos El Kotob.

The court earlier heard how Gopali Dahl was manipulated and coerced into participating in the scheme by someone else who was involved.

The associate Dahl was referring to cannot be identified for legal reasons and is not referred to anywhere else in this story.

Firos El Kotob is another key player. Picture: Facebook

Dal’s early life was riddled with adversity. She rarely saw a single person outside her ultrareligious community perched on a northern NSW farm, which she shared with her polyamorous parents, her dad’s several wives and eight children.

At 12-years-old, she was holding the hand of her little brother when he was fatally hit by a car.

The 33-year-old woman gave evidence about her unusual upbringing and limited exposure to the outside world during a sentence hearing for her part in the complex syndicate.

The court heard eventually Dahl realised the companies, including those linked to her name, were dealing with large quantities of cash – and much of it was not legal.

The main security business was used as a “front” in a mega joint-criminal enterprise which laundered money in and out of the hands of organised criminals in Australia and abroad and handled upwards of $100 million in just a few years.

Dahl, of Murwillumbah in far northeastern NSW, pleaded guilty to two charges of dealing with proceeds of crime worth more than $100,000.

One of the ringleaders of the group, Kotob, pleaded guilty to five counts of the same charge, as well as receive suspected proceeds of crime worth more than $100,000 and knowingly or recklessly direct a criminal group to assist crime.

The crown prosecutor argued the 46-year-old former Bankstown restaurant owner supplied or had sources of money for the purpose of sending it overseas, generally to China, and the crimes could not have occurred without him as the source of the dirty cash.

The defence claimed he was just as responsible for the group’s dealings as another co-offender, as opposed to more responsible.

The court heard Kotob’s mother was murdered when he was 10 and he looked after his brothers from a young age when his father became ill. He worked at Woolworths and as a taxi driver before becoming involved in promotional work with his restaurant in 2003, but faced crippling debt in his home country of Lebanon.

Reading from agreed facts, Judge Ian McClintock asked the defence lawyer, seemingly rhetorically as he did not receive an answer: “Your client is getting $100 million plus and giving it to [a co-offender]?”

Manminder Singh, a 34-year-old man from Westmead, pleaded guilty to two charges of dealing with proceeds of crime worth more than $100,000 and one count of participating in a criminal group.

Dahl and Kotob are due to be sentenced at Downing Centre District Court on June 9 and Singh on June 10.