An independent South Australian MP allegedly failed to return more than $400,000 to the accounts of not-for-profit organisations he managed in the state’s south-east, a court has heard.
Troy Stephen Bell, 50, is standing trial in the South Australian District Court after pleading not guilty to 20 counts of theft and six counts of dishonest dealing with documents between 2009 and 2013.
Prosecutor Jemma Litster told the jury in her closing address that a forensic accountant, who gave evidence over five days, calculated at least $436,023.24 had been withdrawn from the accounts of a not-for-profit organisation and never returned.
“There was no equivalence of what went out and what went back,” she said.
“Over $400,000 more went out than came back.
“It was a conservative calculation, I suggest, in Mr Bell’s favour.”
Ms Litster previously told the court the alleged offending began in 2009 after Mr Bell, who was then employed by the Department for Education, helped establish and run the Independent Learning Centre (ILC) in Mount Gambier in 2006.
The ILC was established to help high school students who had become disengaged with mainstream schooling return to study.
Ms Litster said it was alleged that funds he stole were those that were intended to be used for the purpose of the associations in the south-east, which invoiced Millicent High School to fund the ILC.
“The first of those was called the South-East Education and Training Association, referred to as SEETA, the second, the Limestone Coast Education and Training Association, referred to as LCETA,” she said.
The alleged offending continued until 2013 when he quit to pursue a career in politics.
On Monday, Ms Litster said in early 2016 Mr Bell told different people “different things about what had happened”.
He was subsequently charged for the alleged offending in May 2017.
“When the ICAC attended he told Mr Baker, the ICAC officer who spoke with him at the dining room table, ‘It’s just a political witch-hunt but that’s OK,'” she said.
Ms Litster said Mr Bell then “placated” his wife when explaining the extent of what allegedly happened.
“He told her that he had said to Isobel Redmond that he thinks that they have got him on these two fronts, ‘Be honest, one of them I’ve got no defence,’ but he tells her that all money was paid back,” she said.
“In [a subsequent call to his wife] he then says, ‘I’m super confident that I did not steal one cent. There might be errors in judgement of moving monies around,'” she said.
“An error of judgement, that’s how he’s described it to his wife.
“In my submission to you, he’s placating his wife in that phone call.”
Ms Litster also told the court Mr Bell was motivated by home renovations and “greed”.
“Mr Bell’s interest in property renovations was heightened at the time when the offending appeared to commence,” she said.
“So, I’m speaking now to what sometimes is called motive. It’s the prosecution case there was a general motive of greed and an ongoing capacity to benefit financially from the system he had in operation, including through a mortgage offset.
“Part of the motive was offsetting his mortgage with monies intended to be deployed on children’s education programs which were the property of the third parties.”
The trial, which started in June, is continuing.