Ex-LJ Hooker franchisee Judy Nguyen embraced husband’s ‘ponzi’ scheme, court hears
A former LJ Hooker franchisee who embraced her husband’s tactics of misusing clients money has requested a lesser sentence, claiming she only became complicit in order to “keep their business afloat”, a court has been told.
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The former head of six LJ Hooker offices should be jailed for embracing her husband’s “ponzi-style” scheme to misappropriate hundreds of thousands of dollars of clients’ money, prosecutors have argued in court.
But the defence for Truc Thanh Le Nguyen, also known as Judy Nguyen, requested a lesser sentence, stating the mother of four became complicit in her husband’s fraud in an attempt to “keep (their real estate) business afloat”.
Ms Nguyen was bailed to reappear in court on June 11 for sentencing.
She pleaded guilty on Monday to 11 counts of fraudulently converting to her own use deposits totalling $809,016 and related to 11 Melbourne home sales, received from January to March 2016.
Prosecutor John Saunders told the County Court on Thursday that charge carried a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment.
The court heard Ms Nguyen had also pleaded guilty to summary offences related to her failure to comply with her duties as officer in effective control of her business, JNT Law Investments Pty Ltd, which traded as six LJ Hooker offices.
The court heard Ms Nguyen‘s husband, Tri Duc Ngo, also known as Joseph Ngo, initiated the scheme to misappropriate trust account funds in 2015 and she became complicit in 2016.
Mr Ngo was jailed in 2018 for five years, with a minimum term of three years, after pleading guilty to 48 charges relating to the misappropriation of about $6.4 million from sales and rental trust accounts in 2015 and 2016.
Mr Ngo fuelled an ice habit, and lavish jewellery and clothing purchases, with the money.
He was also ordered to pay $2.1 million to cover costs paid out to victims.
Mr Saunders said if Ms Nguyen had fulfilled her duties as officer in effective control, “her husband’s offending would have been detected as a much earlier stage”.
Ms Nguyen “embraced” the scheme in 2016 and it became “a shared enterprise”, he said.
Mr Saunders told the court a sentence of imprisonment would be appropriate for Ms Nguyen, urging Judge Michael Bourke to take into account the fact her guilty plea came after her trial had run for two full days.
Ms Nguyen’s defence initially told a jury Mr Ngo had committed the crimes without her knowledge.
Alan Marshall, for Ms Nguyen, said his client was largely removed from work in 2014 and 2015 due to a difficult pregnancy, resulting in the birth of her fourth child, and a cervical cancer diagnosis.
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When she was working, her focus was sales, while Mr Ngo attended to the accounts.
He said when Ms Nguyen became involved in the offending, she did so “to keep the business running” and also began divesting herself of assets to recoup some money.
Judge Bourke said he did not expect to impose as heavy as sentence as Mr Ngo had received, but noted general deterrence was important as being a real estate agent was a position of “trust and privilege”.