The disgraced Dunedin financial adviser, Barry Kloogh, will spend five years behind bars after most of his appeal against his sentence was dismissed.
Photo: RNZ / Tess Brunton
The 57-year-old this week appealed his prison sentence, non-parole period and a $5 million reparation order imposed on him.
Kloogh was jailed for eight years and 10 months in July after defrauding dozens of investors of more than $15 million.
A minimum non-parole period of five years and four months was imposed.
He admitted 11 charges brought by the Serious Fraud Office in March.
Earlier this week his lawyer, Sarah Saunderson-Warner, argued the sentencing judge's starting point for her client's sentence was too high.
She also told the High Court Kloogh should have received greater credit for his co-operation with authorities and his victims once the offending was uncovered.
The non-parole period of five years was too harsh, she said.
But crown prosecutor, Robin Bates, said the appeal should be dismissed in its entirety and a reparation order allowed so some payment - even if it was nominal - could be paid to the victims.
At his sentencing in the Dunedin District Court in July, victims detailed how he stole and squandered their savings and investments on a luxury lifestyle.
Before his sentencing, 81 victims of Kloogh were identified.
One woman told the court in July that Kloogh stole more than $700,000 from her and her dying husband. She said Kloogh's manipulation included contacting her husband while he was receiving chemotherapy.
The woman said her husband died thinking Kloogh was a trusted friend.
Many victims spoke of Kloogh grooming them through friendship before taking all he could, including KiwiSaver retirement funds.
His companies, Financial Planning Limited and Impacted Enterprises Limited, came under investigation in May last year.
The two companies were placed into interim liquidation in July before formally being placed into liquidation on 29 August by the High Court.
The following month Kloogh had his authorised financial adviser authorisation cancelled by the Financial Markets Authority.
Justice Rachel Dunningham, in her decision, released today, quashed the reparation order but upheld his sentence.
"It is clear that the amount to be repaid by way of reparation should be realistic given the financial resources of the offender. Where there is no realistic chance that payment will be made within a few years an order should not be made for the full amount sought. While the Sentencing Act does not specify any period or maximum period during which reparation is to be paid, generally a Court should not bond an offender for long periods. The Courts rarely make orders which require payments over more than a five year period," her judgment said.
"In my view, the order for reparation was inappropriate when Mr Kloogh was to spend more than five years in prison given the minimum period of imprisonment imposed, and where all parties accepted it was highly unlikely that funds would be available at any point in the future. Indeed, I consider to make the order is to raise false hope in the many victims of Mr Kloogh's dishonesty."