Matthew Hanks ‘greedy and dishonest’ for Surf Life Saving fraud: judge

District Court Judge John Pickering found some of the excuses given by disgraced Surf Life Saving NSW boss Matthew Hanks for cheating the charity to be “incredulous”.

Double-crossing former Surf Life Saving NSW boss Matthew Hanks was deceitful, dishonest and greedy as he cheated the charity out of almost $2 million, a judge said on Friday.

Hanks, who quit the organisation in 2016 when his scams were uncovered, had pleaded guilty to six counts of fraud but sought to minimise his criminality by claiming he had just been trying to do the best by SLS NSW and save them money.

Judge John Pickering said he found some of the excuses “incredulous”.

“He did lie to the company, he did cheat them and he had done it for a number of years,” the District Court judge said. “Whether he accepts it now, he was greedy”.

Hanks, 52, used the rorts to fund a millionaire’s lifestyle including two mansions and a yacht, which he has since lost in civil proceedings brought by the charity seeking to get some of its money back.

He listened via video link on Friday as Judge Pickering ruled on the facts of the case, which had been dispute despite Hanks’ pleas of guilty.

The judge said he believed Hanks may have started out thinking he was helping the charity but was soon motivated by the money he could make.

Former Surf Life Saving NSW boss Matthew Hanks admitted defrauding the charity. Picture: Madeline Crittenden

Hanks admitted defrauding the organisation of $400,000 by invoicing the SLSNSW printing work to his own company, See Hear Speak, but subcontracting it out to cheaper operators, pocketing the difference.

Hanks said he had found the charity’s printing work to have been haphazard and ad hoc when he joined as general manager.

He had a background in printing, he thought he would streamline it by putting it through his own company and doing a lot of work in his own time, he said.

Hanks claimed to have “value added” by doing graphic design and organising packaging and deliveries.

But he consistently lied when asked by SLSNSW management if he had any conflict of interest in the printing work, Judge Pickering said.

Hanks also pleaded guilty to using a fictitious name to create a false invoice for $121,000 worth of construction work done at the Port Macquarie Surf Club.

He altered the name on the cheque to resemble his own then depositing the money into his bank account.

He claimed to he done so because otherwise the money would have had to be returned to the NSW Government as an unused portion of the grant and he had meant to pay it back.

“That seems, to be perfectly frank, incredulous,” Judge Pickering said.

Hanks also pleaded guilty to using inflated invoices when buying and selling cars for the organisation. There were 55 cars involved which netted Hanks more than $1,318,000.

The judge rejected Hanks’ claim that it had been the dealerships who had suggested the rort, which included adding up to $2000 to the invoice of every car when SLS was exempt from dealer delivery charges.

He said Hanks tried to justify what he did by saying he was working weekends and putting in a lot of his own time buying and selling fleet cars for SLS.

However the judge said the charity could have brought in a firm to manage the fleet vehicles.

Judge Pickering said he gave Hanks the “benefit of the doubt” that he had only rorted $905,000 from the car sales and accepted that there was an aspect to Hanks’ thinking that he was going to help SLS “but at the end of the day, none of it was beneficial to SLS”.

“It showed significant deceit on his part,” the judge said. “Some of it was pure greed.”

Judge Pickering was critical of the charity’s slack management, which allowed Hanks to get away with what he did, but he said that was not to excuse it.

Hanks remains on bail at his Wollongong home and will be sentenced on January 27.