Westpac takes on allegedly crooked banker
A former St George bank staffer is being pursued by Westpac as she prepares to fight allegations she defrauded multiple banks in order to fund her lavish lifestyle.
Police claim Sara Daizli used her role at St George bank to open accounts in fictitious names and swindle hundreds of thousands of dollars between February 2016 and December 2018.
She allegedly siphoned money into her bank account under a false name and used the ill-gotten gains to line her pockets.
The 32-year-old is also accused of making fraudulent loan applications to St George as well as ANZ bank.
She has pleaded not guilty to a staggering 120 charges, including dealing with the proceeds of a crime and 108 counts of dishonestly gaining a financial advantage by deception.
On Tuesday, Ms Daizli wore a short beige dress and a long white blazer with black high heels as she faced Sydney Downing Centre District Court ahead of her trial.
Her lawyer Abigail Bannister revealed Ms Daizli is also facing civil proceedings brought by Westpac Bank in relation to her alleged fraud.
Ms Bannister has issued four subpoenas to the bank in relation to the criminal allegations against her client, some of which the court heard also relate to the civil proceedings.
A lawyer for Westpac told the court the bank had been going to “extreme lengths” to find the requested documents and hand them over, but the volume of material sought meant the subpoenas “might be oppressive”.
He told the court Westpac had not received an outline of Ms Daizli’s proposed defence, so the bank had “no idea why these documents are sought”.
The parties will discuss a number of issues related to the subpoenas in a hearing later this month.
Ms Bannister pushed for the matter to be resolved as soon as possible, as her client’s trial is set to begin in September.
“Our concern is the trial date could be placed in jeopardy if the bank is not given enough time to produce the documents,” she said.
“There’s quite a lot of records that are sought.”
Acting Judge Graeme Henson adjourned the matter until July 19 and urged the parties to continue to whittle down the number of issues in dispute.
