‘Living the high life’: jetsetter accountant Mina Saad blew stolen cash on gambling, coke and meth
A Melbourne accountant who stole more than $250,000 from his boss told a sob story to a sentencing judge in a bid to justify his crimes. But these photos of him living the high life paint a different picture.
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A jetsetting accountant with a penchant for high-stakes gambling, top-shelf drugs, fast cars and exotic travel locations has been jailed after he fleeced more than $250,000 from his Kensington employer.
Mina Saad, 32, was sentenced in the County Court on September 9 to 12 months in prison after pleading guilty to two charges of theft.
Saad had been employed as the Polivac International Pty Ltd accountant for barely a month when he began diverting company funds to his own bank account in September, 2015.
The Latrobe University accountancy graduate stole $256,000 via 43 fraudulent transactions.
These transferrals included money fleeced from a second company connected to Polivac located at the Kensington site.
Saad stopped stealing from both companies in October, 2016 but remained employed with Polivac until December that year.
His deceit was eventually uncovered by Polivac’s new accountant in March, 2017.
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Polivac owner Tony Antonious — Australia’s leading manufacturer of commercial cleaning equipment — reported Saad to police in July.
The high-flying accountant was charged in November 2017 after he gave a “no comment” interview to police.
In his victim impact statement, Mr Antonious said Saad’s swindling affected his business reputation, relationship with customers, suppliers and financial institutions, which led to severe, anxiety, stress, and psychological ill health.
Saad quit accountancy after leaving Polivac and briefly ran a pop-up coffee shop in Camberwell.
He now manages a gym while running his own personal training business.
The court heard he was a hard worker who worked three jobs while at university.
Saad told a psychologist he stole the money because he had been going through a tough time with his ex, he’d fallen in with the wrong crowd and got into drugs and gambling.
He said $115,000 was blown at Crown Casino and much of the rest went on cocaine and meth.
However, photos tendered during the plea showed Saad living it up in Dubai and Thailand during the offending.
Judge Scott Johns said the photographs provided a compelling visual account of what sort of lifestyle he was pursuing or had aspirations to pursue.
“You might be said to be living the high life on Mr Antonious’ companies’ funds.”
Judge John labelled the offending as “extremely serious”.
“Your extraordinary fraud left the companies in a dire financial predicament,” he said.
“Employers must be able to conduct their business trusting those that have employed to be honest … especially where matters of accounting are concerned.
“You breached that trust on 43 occasions over a 13-month period not long after you first walked through the door.”
Saad, who has no priors, was sentenced to 12 months in prison and a 30-month community corrections order.
He had spent 12 days in custody at the time of sentencing.
Saad has paid back $23,000.
Originally published as ‘Living the high life’: jetsetter accountant Mina Saad blew stolen cash on gambling, coke and meth