Former CBA executive Jon Waldron ‘showed no remorse’ over $2m kickback scandal

Ex-Commonwealth Bank IT executive Jon Waldron has been handed a minimum sentence of four years after accepting bribes and profiting off his position.

Former CBA executive Jon Waldron, centre, pictured outside court in 2018. Picture: Jeremy Piper

Former Commonwealth Bank IT executive Jon Waldron has been jailed after he was found guilty of corruptly accepting kickbacks worth nearly $2m.

Alongside co-offender Keith Hunter, Waldron was caught handing major CBA contracts to California-based IT firm ServiceMesh without a tender in 2014.

Waldron, a 53-year-old New Zealand national, and Hunter, the former head of IT, were charged with bribery for accepted payments from Ser­viceMesh in return for providing the company CBA contracts worth millions of dollars.

The men were fired by the bank in 2014 and charged in 2015. Hunter was jailed in 2016 for three years and six months with a non-parole period of two years and three months.

The judge said Jon Waldron, pictured here in 2018, showed ‘no remorse’. Picture: Jeremy Piper

Waldron was charged with 10 offences, including receiving $1.9m and aiding and abetting the receipt of $630,000 by Hunter. On Friday, NSW District Court Judge Phillip Mahony sentenced Waldron to six years and eight months jail, with a non-parole period of four years.

In his sentencing remarks, Justice Mahony said he considered Waldron’s offending to be “serious” with respect to the first seven charges, and noted he played an “integral role” in progressing negotiations for one of the deals with ServiceMesh and an “important role” in the other.

“I have also taken into account that the offending involved a breach of trust by the offender of his obligations to his employer, the CBA,” he said.

“I am therefore satisfied that there was a substantial breach of trust here, and that it aggravated the objective seriousness of the offending.

“I find that all of the offending conduct of the offender was of a high moral culpability, given his employment as a senior IT executive with the CBA responsible for a large number of staff and a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars.”

Waldron continued to “protest his innocence” and had appealed his convictions, showing “no remorse for his offending conduct”, Justice Mahony said.

“And (he) has made no progress in his rehabilitation,” he said.

Keith Hunter, left, was jailed over the scandal in 2016.

“Rather, I accept the conclusion of the author of the sentencing assessment report that his focus has been on how his offending has impacted upon himself, both financially and emotionally and that he is unable to identify how his actions may have impacted the ­community.

“Notwithstanding that, I accept that he is at a low risk of reoffending given that it is unlikely he will be able to obtain employment in any position of trust in the future.”

Waldon had no other criminal convictions at the time of offending and was “a man of good character”, Justice Mahony said.

ServiceMesh is a start-up headed by Eric Pulier that was bought by US computing giant CSC for about $US325m in 2013.

During Waldron’s sentencing hearing, the Crown argued his offending was particularly serious because he was “employed as a senior manager entrusted with a high degree of responsibility, including managing a budget of $740m a year and 250 staff”.

“The Crown submitted that the offender and Mr Hunter used their positions of authority to force through contracts that involved technical software products,” Justice Mahony said.

Justice Mahony said Waldron had been adopted and moved to Australia from New Zealand in 2001 at the age of 30.

“Following his arrival in Australia he quickly acquired work as an IT consultant with the CBA and obtained a permanent role with the bank in 2008 where his career flourished, becoming general manager of technology infrastructure in 2011,” he said.

Originally published as Former CBA executive Jon Waldron ‘showed no remorse’ over $2m kickback scandal