By Paul Gregoire and Ugur Nedim
Mohammed Syed was employed as an assistant accountant by Crosby Textor Research Strategies Results (CTRSR), a subsidiary of UK registered CT Group, in October 2008. He was promoted to CTRSR financial controller in September 2009, and by February 2018, he’d risen to become the financial controller of CT Group, and over time, his salary rose from $60,000 to $185,000, plus bonuses.
Syed’s position involved oversight of all financial aspects of CTRSR and its associate entities, both in Australia and overseas. This included access to the company’s bank accounts and approval of payments made. But due to company restructuring in October 2018, his position was made redundant and it was agreed he’d cease work on 25 January 2019, with a full redundancy package.
However, on 7 January 2019, a new CTRSR employee commenced, and over the following two weeks, she discovered a number of anomalies relating to the company’s expense payments. These discrepancies in accounting saw Syed transfer $182,492 into his own pay account, which consisted of 19 separate deposits, over six years: between the period of 3 January 2012 and 15 March 2018.
Syed was able to do this, as the unwarranted payments were limited amounts included amongst legitimate payments to himself and others and registered as “incentives to group participants” in the accounts.
At a meeting with managing director David Bell, Syed later explained that he’d paid himself extra when reimbursing his own credit card after employees used it for work expenses. Indeed, CTRSR did not have company credits cards, and staff were expected to cover expenses and then be reimbursed.
At a later meeting, Syed told Bell he would forgo his redundancy, and he signed an agreement to pay back the defrauded sums. Syed ended his employment in late January 2019, however CTRSR then reported the fraud to the NSW police and on 13 March that year, Syed was arrested and charged.
Slim excuses for skimming off accounts
Syed entered pleas of guilty in the NSW District Court in respect of six counts of dishonestly obtaining a financial advantage by deception, or the offence of fraud, contrary to subsection 192E(1)(b) of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW). This crime carries up to 10 years prison time.
NSW District Court Judge Nicole Noman assessed the fraud to have involved some planning, which was revealed by his “accounting tricks” that concealed his crimes and the fact he employed a similar process on each occasion. Syed was further found to have taken advantage of his position of authority and the high level of trust he’d built over years of employment with the “victim company”.
Her Honour added that Syed “had no obvious need for the funds”. He was in a marriage where his wife contributed financially. He had no gambling or substance use issues or pre-existing mental health impairment, and nor did he have any purpose for the funds. The judge assessed the crimes as above mid-range of objective seriousness, “despite the relatively limited quantum involved”.
Syed, 49, had no previous criminal record. He was of good character before the offending, and he was a proactive contributor to the community and helped others. But he appeared to be living a “double life”, assessed the judge. And following his arrest, Syed was hospitalised for several days over anxiety and depression and also, he’d had suicidal and self-harm ideation.
But her Honour didn’t accept a psychological report that he’d taken a “lenient” approach to his accounting and dropped his standards, but rather she found he’d accepted no responsibility for his wrongdoing and showed no remorse. The judge also accepted that he posed a low risk of reoffending, but found he lied in his submission as he’d been working as an accountant again.
Judge Noman sentenced Syed on 25 October 2024 to 4 years and 9 months imprisonment, with non-parole set at 2 years and 10 months. This included a 10 percent discount for the utilitarian value of his early guilty pleas.
This discount was lower than the 25 percent discount that many early guilty pleas garner, as Syed’s was only entered “two weeks before the third listing of the trial, following negotiations and an amended indictment”.
A prolonged period of offending
Syed then appealed his sentence to the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal (NSWCCA) on 13 March 2026. The offender did so based on two grounds. The first was that the sentencing judge had made an error, when finding that Syed “did not voluntarily desist” from his offending but was rather forced to stop “when his employment ceased”. The second was that his sentence was manifestly excessive.
NSW Chief Judge at Common Law Natalie Adams explained that the point involved in the first ground was not raised during the initial trial, and usually when appealing a lower court’s decision, arguments or matters that had not been raised during the earlier hearings of a trial cannot be raised at an appeal. But there are exceptions to this rule.
In this case it was found, it had been the Crown’s position that Syed’s period of offending continued until he was caught, and that was considered an aggravating factor, or made his crime more serious, and the judge had proceeded on this basis, while Syed’s lawyers raised no issue with this.
But as the point raised was a “significant” “factual finding”, it was found appropriate to proceed with an appeal, despite the matter not having been raised during the NSW District Court hearings.
During the court proceedings, Judge Noman remarked that Syed had continued his conduct defrauding the company for six years. “He did not voluntarily desist. He stopped when his employment ceased. His conduct was only discovered when new staff became involved in the financial aspects of the company.” And these points made by the judge resulted in an appeal being warranted, in her Honour’s opinion.
NSWCCA Justice Dina Yehia pointed out that the indictment to which Syed pleaded guilty stated that the offending took place between “3 January 2012 and 15 March 2018”. The defence never asserted in court, however, that Syed had voluntarily desisted from his offending prior to termination, while the only assertion about when he’d stopped the fraud was made in the Crown’s submission.
Further, the Crown asserted this point distinctly. This was set out under a heading titled “Period of Offending”, and this played a factor in assessing the objective seriousness of the crimes, while the Crown too posited both at the initial hearing and on appeal that the continuing nature of the crimes and the period of offending were more important factors in assessment than the amount defrauded.
“This was a factor (together with other factors) relied upon as aggravating the objective seriousness of the offending and therefore had to be established beyond reasonable doubt,” Justice Yehia explained. And whilst the sentencing judge did not single out Syed as not desisting his offending until being caught as an aggravating factor, it did play into the judge’s overall assessment of seriousness.
Her Honour then raised several reasons why it was not open to the sentencing judge to find that Syed’s offending continued to the point of termination.
The first was the fact that the indictment involved six representative counts, or counts involving more than one crime, but these representative counts did not suggest ongoing criminal behaviour until the end of Syed’s employment, because each count covered multiple identified crimes and the sixth count ended on 15 March 2018, long before he ended his employment.
The account in the Crown’s submission involving the exchanges and admissions about the offending between the managing director and Syed, noted that specific anomalies in accounting that were identified in the representative counts were discussed, and nothing was said about ongoing fraudulent behaviour.
The third point was that in the Agreed Facts of the case, the Crown had relied on a paragraph that stated “throughout the course of the offender’s employment” he had committed fraud. But the facts also contained other paragraphs stating, “between 3 January 2012 and 15 March 2018, the offender” committed his crimes and “the following 6 counts are accepted by the Crown in full satisfaction”.
And a further sentence appeared in the Agreed Facts that stated, “The offender accepts that his offending was not isolated and that it was consistent and ongoing through the period 2012 to 2018.”
“There was simply insufficient evidence from which to make any finding (either in mitigation or aggravation) about when or why the applicant’s fraudulent activity ceased,” Justice Yehia determined. “The error is material. It had the capacity to affect the assessment of objective seriousness and to potentially affect the finding of absence of remorse.”
A “material” error is a mistake of fact made by a judicial officer that likely affected the outcome of the case.
So, her Honour found that ground one was made out, which meant resentencing had to take place, and therefore, there was no reason to deliberate on the second ground of appeal.
A term of imprisonment required
In resentencing, Justice Yehia assessed, in the same manner as the sentencing judge had, that general deterrence and denunciation were important factors in determining the correct sentence, as these were serious fraud crimes involving employee dishonesty and therefore, a term of imprisonment was warranted.
On 24 April 2026, her Honour quashed the October 2024 NSW District Court sentence, and resentenced Syed to 3 years and 9 months gaol time, with non-parole set at 2 years. And the NSW Chief Judge at Common Law and NSWCCA Justice Peter Hamill agreed with their colleague’s orders.
