Plush bail for IHC swindler

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A former Wellington restaurateur will await sentencing at her plush Ohakune lodge, after admitting stealing almost $600,000 donated to disabled children.

Well turned out in a black dress, former IHC national fundraising manager Lynn Fiebig, 56, stood impassively in Wellington District Court yesterday. She pleaded guilty to 74 counts of fraudulently using documents, and one of laundering money.

Fiebig started at IHC in 2003, and was promoted to national fundraising manager in September 2007.

Between October 31, 2006, and May 25, 2009, she used fake invoices from three fictitious companies – Lander Group, Maxim Design Group and Mary Owen Transport – to steal $590,029.

The fraud was detected by a regular internal review, but only after Fiebig left IHC in June.

For IHC, the fraud was the worst 60th birthday present imaginable. The charity is still coming to terms with the loss of one-fifth of its annual fundraising revenue, and the betrayal of trust. Devastated co-workers shed tears in court as the guilty pleas were read.

Rugby legend and IHC supporter Sir Colin Meads said he was shocked by the theft.

Sir Colin, who Fiebig enlisted to be the face of an IHC fundraising scheme, told Radio New Zealand her offending "came as a huge shock" but he was pleased she had spared the charity further pain by pleading guilty.

IHC chief executive Ralph Jones said the fraud, while horrifying, was small compared with the charity's annual turnover of $260 million. All organisations had to operate on trust and he was confident the charity's financial controls were sound.

However, some changes would be made to recruitment processes and to ensure one person was not responsible for so many accounting functions.

IHC was working with Fiebig's lawyers to recover the money and had started civil proceedings, Mr Jones said. "I expect nothing less than full reparation to be made as soon as possible. I'll accept nothing less. We owe that to our volunteers and donors."

Melrose mother Anne Gilbert was appalled by the theft. Her son Edward, 18, who has Down syndrome, is unlikely to find work because of a shortage of adult disability support services. He relies on IHC's advocacy service for help, but its budget has been cut. National fundraising also pays to train the volunteers that give him "normal experiences", such as swimming or going out for coffee.

"I felt sick – just shocked that someone could do it over such a long period of time to satisfy their own desires."

For Fiebig, it was a dramatic fall from grace.

The former co-owner of Fiebig's Cafe in Thorndon, which she opened with former husband and furniture designer Geoff Fiebig in 1992, now runs the $550-a-night Ahuru Lodge, with Richard Chittock.

The theft largely coincided with the building and furnishing of the architecturally designed retreat.

The pair bought the one-hectare riverside property in September 2007 and the lodge opened last June.

Valued at $720,000, no expense was spared: king-sized beds with 1000-threadcount Egyptian cotton sheets, goosedown pillows and a New Zealand cedar sauna room.

Fiebig has been bailed to live at the lodge until sentencing in March.

Her fraud marked the end of a bad year for IHC, which lost an appeal against an Employment Court ruling that disability support workers must be paid a minimum $12.50 an hour during sleepovers.

IHC estimates the move would cost an unaffordable $20m a year in extra wages.

Apology

An article on Saturday about the court appearance of Lynn Fiebig stated that Alexander Fiebig and Richard Chittock received payment from the false invoices involved. That was wrong. The Dominion Post accepts that none of the payments involved relating to the false invoices was made to either Alexander Fiebig or Richard Chittock and apologises for this error.

- © Fairfax NZ News