Liquidations

Ferrier Hodgson pair duped by fake mortgages

KPMG’s Max Donnelly. KPMG’s Robyn Duggan. A judge has suggested liquidators and former partners of Ferrier Hodgson demonstrated one of the last desirable characteristics in those responsible for administering insolvent entities – they were too trusting. In Combined Property Holdings Pty Ltd v Galea & Ors [2020] QSC 338 Justice James Henry of the Supreme Court of Queensland in Cairns recounts how Robyn Duggan and…


Seven month silence earns adverse costs order

Worrells Partner Aaron Lucan. Worrells’ partner Aaron Lucan has been ordered to pay an indemnity costs order personally after indulging a seven month silence in respect of proceedings brought against the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation (DCoT) by a company to which Lucan is the appointed liquidator. “The effect of ordering the first plaintiff to pay the defendants’ costs would be to visit the consequences of…


The risks of tapping proceeds of crime for fees

O’Brien Palmer’s Daniel Frisken. Never presume to position yourself between the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police and an allegedly ill-gotten dollar. As O’Brien Palmer’s Daniel Frisken has discovered, and as is detailed in the matter of The Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police v Pharmacy Depot Hurstville Pty Ltd (in liq) (No 2) [2020] NSWSC 1571 the outcome is unlikely to prove favourable to…


Ex-VA back as liquidator after incumbent ousted

DW Advisory’s Paul Weston. Worrells partner Simon Cathro. Paul Weston has been appointed liquidator of South Pelagic Holdings Pty Ltd at a meeting convened at the behest of creditors seeking to punt Worrells’ Simon Cathro, whom a court had in February appointed to replace the company’s then administrator, Weston. Independence breach you shrill? No. Not a bit of it. At least not according to Weston…


Liquidator next to grill Premier’s disgraced ex

Louttit & Associates’ Jamieson Louttit While the recent ICAC hearings were what put the spotlight on NSW Premier Gladys Berijiklian’s former relationship with former Wagga Wagga local member Darryl Maguire, Sydney insolvency practitioner Jamieson Louttit is also planning to illuminate certain activities connected to the disgraced ex-politician. Last month Louttit replaced PKF’s Brad Tonks as liquidator of UWE Hay Pty Ltd, UWE – Griffith Property…


Auxilium’s Cockatoo coup bails out ex-receivers

Auxilium Partners’ Bob Jacobs. There will be jubilation in certain quarters following the sale last week of Pluton Resources’ iron ore operation on Cockatoo Island, located in the aptly named Buccaneer Archipelago off West Australia’s northern coast. Whilst Pluton receiver and Auxilium Partners principal Bob Jacobs can claim credit for succeeding where a procession of his predecessors failed, KordaMentha’s John Bumbak and Janna Robertson (now…


Liquidator facing alleged 180, 181 breaches

Sydney liquidator Greg Parker has been handed a potential migraine after a judge ordered ASIC to reinstate two companies wound up by Parker and subsequently deregistered in 2016 and 2019. The companies – Worldwide Speciality Property Services Pty Ltd (WSPS) and Serif Pty Ltd (Serif) – between them controlled a suite of patents lodged in the US. Those patents have since expired and the companies’…


Liquidator of LMIML challenges receiver’s fees

FTI Consulting’s John Park. LMIML receiver David Whyte. If recently retired BDO partner David Whyte ever thought the finalisation of his work as receiver of LM Investment Management Limited (LMIML) would be uneventful, then FTI Consulting’s John Park has well and truly disabused him of that notion. In recent months Park has, as liquidator of LMIML, challenged Whyte’s remuneration claims, with the most recent challenge…


Banned ex-liquidator fails in RC Group suppression bid

Veritas Advisory’s David Iannuzzi. Veritas Advisory principal David Iannuzzi was never going to suffer iNO reporting on his public examination into the affairs of RC Group Aust Pty Ltd (RC Group) without objection it seems but the Federal Court has ruled that this was a stoush the ex-liquidator couldn’t win. On Monday Federal Court Registrar Susan O’Connor advised the parties that she had refused to…


PKF pounces as Hall Chadwick bounces

In: PKF’s Paul Allen. Out: Hall Chadwick’s Richard Lawrence. The torment endured by Hall Chadwick pair Richard Lawrence and Richard Albarran these last 18 months came to an end this week when creditors of Tauro Capital (In Liq) turfed them out to make way for Paul Allen and Jason Stone from PKF. iNO’s agents in Melbourne reported that Tauro creditors, some of whom had been…