Daughter with runaway instant millionaires

By MIKE WATSON and RUTH HILL - The Dominion Post

The Blenheim mother of a woman who has fled New Zealand with her boyfriend after they received a multimillion dollar bank credit is pleading with her to come home.

Westpac bank says it is "vigorously" attempting to get back $3.8 million taken from an account it mistakenly credited.

Police have not named the couple, understood to be Rotorua service station owner Leo Gao and his girlfriend Kara Yang.

The bank has not identified the account holder, but said the person had in place a temporary overdraft facility with a limit up to $100,000, but because of a staff error the limit became $10 million.

The customer then attempted to transfer amounts totalling around $6.7m, but the bank has managed to recover $2.8m.

Police, who are refusing to confirm speculation over the case, said today those being sought were believed to have travelled to Hong Kong.

International police liaison organisation Interpol had been called to help find them.

TV3's Campbell Live said tonight Ms Yang's daughter Leena and sister Aroha were with her.

Ms Yang's mother, Sue Hurring, told the channel it was hard to believe what had happened, describing her daughter as "beautiful and honest".

"This was the crazy thing, she has never pinched a thing in her life - probably as a little girl, yes - but she is so honest, so honest."

She said it was "overwhelming" and just wanted her girls home.

"Just come home now, it will be OK," Ms Hurring pleaded.

As for Mr Gao, she said he was an "OK guy", but she would "like to wring his blimmin' neck".

The couple told a friend they were going on a holiday before disappearing.

Detective Senior Sergeant David Harvey of Rotorua CIB said police and Westpac were investigating the "inappropriate operation" of a Rotorua business account where money had been withdrawn.

The money was believed to be in the account on or about May 5 but it was only on Wednesday this week that police publicly said they were investigating.

Inquiries to find those involved were continuing through Interpol and official channels in Beijing, police said.

The money's disappearance is believed to be connected to a Rotorua BP service station, part-owned by one of the missing couple, which went into receivership on May 8.

The service station traded as Barnett's BP and was registered in the Companies Register under Heights Services Ltd. The company directors are named as Hui Gao and Huan Di Zhang.

Leo Gao lived in a house close to the service station, with other family members. The unoccupied, furnished house has been for sale for $220,000 since October.

Helaine Aim, owner of neighbouring business St Andrews Bakery, said she was friends with the couple, who she referred to as Leo and Kara, and saw them daily.

She said she last saw them two weeks ago.

"I would go and have coffee with them at their house. They told me they were planning a holiday. I did not see them for a couple of days. I thought it was a little strange but didn't think much about it because I thought they were busy preparing for the holiday."

Mrs Aim said the couple told her they had applied for a loan to refurbish the service station which they were then going to sell.

Westpac said the blunder was put down to human error and did not directly involve its Rotorua branch.

It said it had "taken and continues to take all necessary steps to prevent a mistake such as this happening again".

Westpac had hired a private investigator, Mike Dingwall, to conduct inquiries, the New Zealand Herald said.

Mr Dingwall reportedly told staff of a nearby business he had proof Mr Gao had left the country and that records showed Ms Young had used his credit card in Auckland on May 6.

Chevi Lambert, manager of Andy's Cellar, said she understood Ms Young had not fled New Zealand and was with her mother in Blenheim, however police confirmed she had left the country and was still wanted by authorities.

Ms Young's mother, Suzanne Hurring, owns Michel Hair Dzine in the Queen Market Mall in Blenheim.

FINDERS, KEEPERS?

If $10 million turned up in your account, could you keep it?

-Banking Ombudsman Liz Brown says it is generally a criminal offence to spend money accidentally put into your bank account if you know the money is not yours. In her 15 years as banking ombudsman she had been involved in 10 to 20 "payment by mistake" cases, though none involved millions.

-Massey University banking lecturer Claire Matthews said the recipients would probably not get away with it. "They've taken funds that they're not entitled to, that are not theirs. They've effectively, I guess, become thieves."

SUDDENLY RICHER

Auckland businesswoman Karen Batchelor knows what it feels like to be rich for a day after $80,000 was credited to her National Bank account in error 10 years ago. It turned out a client had made two transfers that day, and the client's bank had accidentally reversed them.

The client was horrified. "She said to me, 'Gosh, you could have done a runner with that,' but actually $80,000 would not be enough to tempt me. I knew bloody well I didn't have that much money."

Daniel Aitcheson, an aftersales and finance adviser at Mayfield Motors in Blenheim said he had $28,000 mistakenly deposited into his National Bank account several years ago.

He said he contacted the bank and let them know about the mystery deposit but was told it would cost him $50 for them to investigate, and that they would refund the money if it was found to be teh bank's error.

After a week-long investigation, Mr Aitcheson said he was bemused when the bank reported that the money was indeed his and it had been an over-the-counter cash deposit.

"I knew it wasn't for me but I was quite surprised when they said the twenty-eight grand was a cash deposit over the counter."

Mr Aitcheson said he decided that if the money was still there in four weeks he would claim it and admits to being a little disappointed when it was withdrawn after three weeks.

"I was sort of counting down," he said. "Obviously someone was freaking out about it."

He said the bank was "pretty apologetic" when they had discovered it was there own blunder and had refunded his $50.

He was even more disappointed when he was told by a friend who worked at ANZ bank at the time that if a bank found that no mistake had been made, that he was entitled to keep the money.

Beneficiary Simon Mainey said he checked his account balance early last month to discover a $580 credit from an unknown person's Visa card. He said he briefly toyed with the idea of keeping the money but decided against it.

"I rang the bank to get them to stop me spending what wasn't mine, to remove any temptation to spend it…Instead they offered to do an investigation to discover where it came from and if the bank was not at fault, this would cost me $25," he said.

Mr Mainey said he declined the offer, as he felt that it would have been the depositor's error and said he would wait for them to realise their mistake. He said he was told the bank would inform him before removing the money.

However, he was annoyed to find that the money had been taken from his account several days later, without his permission.

He said he was not angry that the money had gone back to its rightful owner but at the fact that the bank went into his account without his permission: "In this regard, I was let down," he said.

The voluntary banking code states that a bank can reverse payments made into individual accounts when a bank had made an error.

- with MICHAEL FOX, Stuff.co.nz, and NZPA