Cops ordered to re-arrest fake principal in court blunder

A court bungle saw police dispatched to re-arrest fake principal Neil Lennie on a set of charges he’d already been sentenced on. Listen to Class Act podcast

Neil Lennie leaves Victorian County Court after his sentencing hearing. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Sarah Matray

A court bungle has seen an arrest warrant issued of fake principal Neil Lennie - before it was revoked hours later.

Police had been given orders to arrest the former headmaster after he failed to appear in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Monday morning to face fraud charges.

Hours later, however, the matter was recalled with Magistrate Julie Grainger voiding the warrant she had signed that morning.

“The registry has alerted me to the fact that the charges before the court may be duplicate charges as Neil Lennie has already been committed to the County Court,” Ms Grianger told the court.

CLASS ACT PODCAST: LISTEN TO EPISODE 2 BELOW

EPISODE 3 AVAILABLE THURSDAY, APRIL 15

Charges sheets released to the Herald Sun confirm the charges in question were the same ones Lennie had pleaded guilty to six months earlier.

Lennie was last month convicted and sentenced to a three month wholly suspended jail term and a community correction order after admitting he conned his way through Melbourne’s top private schools for 24 years.

Lennie did not appear at the afternoon hearing during which Ms Grainger adjourned his matter for one week to “give the registry sufficient time to make their enquiries”.

Arrest warrants are automatically issued when accused people on bail or summons do not attend listed hearings.

REAL VICTIMS BEHIND CONMAN TEACHER’S LIES

A former private school principal who hired Lennie would be “turning in her grave” amid revelations he conned his way into her school.

John Bell, 78, says his late wife Lesley lost her prestigious position as principal of Overnewton Anglican Community College because she fought to save her deputy, Lennie, from getting the sack.

“The board had it in for her because of Neil,” Mr Bell told the Sunday Herald Sun from his home in Bendigo.

Mr Bell said his wife died in 2019 never knowing that she had hired a conman whose betrayal cost her her job.

“She’d be nearly in tears that she’d been taken – deceived and taken,” Mr Bell said.

“That would hurt her more than anything. Because she stuck up for him, she basically lost her job,” he said.

Mr Bell said his wife was let go from the elite Keilor school in 2000 because she resisted calls from the school board not to renew Lennie’s employment contract, three years after appointing him as her deputy.

Former principal of Overnewton College Leslie Bell.

Civil documents obtained by the Sunday Herald Sun reveal members of the Overnewton School Board repeatedly requested Ms Bell not renew Lennie’s contract amid her own contract renewal negotiations.

Ms Bell claimed in an unfair dismissal lawsuit launched in 2000 that she had initially been advised her position as principal was “secure” and she would serve out another five years at the school’s helm.

However, a month after meeting with board members who asked her to terminate Lennie, Ms Bell was abruptly told her contract would not be renewed.

Mr Bell said he felt sure that if Lennie wasn’t there, his wife would have led the school for another five years.

Ms Bell died in August 2019 after a battle with dementia.

Mr Bell said the couple had no idea that Lennie had faked his teaching qualifications, and they only learned of his deceit after it was revealed in the Herald Sun.

“She wouldn’t have had anything to do with him … if she knew she wouldn’t have employed him,” he said.

Neil Lennie faked his teaching credentials. Picture: David Geraghty

Ms Bell was appointed principal of Overnewton College in 1995 and oversaw its expansion from one campus in Keilor to a second in Taylors’ Lakes, effectively doubling the student population under her tenure. In a letter written by the popular principal following her dismissal from Overnewton, Ms Bell asked: “What are my chances for the future?”

Ms Bell continued: “To continue in my chosen career as an experienced and highly reputable school principal appears to be no longer an option for me.

“I believe that I will never again have the opportunity to experience the joy of making a direct difference in the lives of the youth of today.”

In this six-part podcast series, reporters Ashley Argoon and Genevieve Alison uncover the truth behind Neil Lennie’s carefully curated facade which he used to fool his colleagues for decades.

Listen to a new episode each Thursday and Sunday, accompanied by a companion story exposing one of Victoria’s biggest frauds.

[e-mail]