The man accused of swindling $7 million from his rich mates is said to have tracked down a money manager in the dead of night and thumped on her door, demanding to know why cash had failed to reach Nigeria.
Maryanne Riechelmann, a manager for Worldwide Transfers, said she had no
idea how Graeme Kenneth Rutherfurd found her home address in Auckland.
But when she answered the door 20 months ago at 1.20 am she faced an agitated 55-year-old claiming that a cash transfer to Nigeria had failed, risking his chance of making an important deal. Rutherfurd later left, but phoned twice more during the night until she managed to transfer the money.
Rutherfurd is a former Citibank senior executive said to have swindled banks and friends of millions of dollars from 1997 as he fell into an African investment scam aimed at fleecing wealthy Westerners.
He allegedly told his friends that he was putting their money into safe investments when he actually spent it trying to unlock a bogus Nigerian account holding $US30 million.
Rutherfurd has denied 19 counts of using a document, three of obtaining by false pretences and one each of theft and forgery.
Yesterday, the High Court at Auckland heard from former senior accountant Donald McDonald, who said Rutherfurd visited him three times in three days to borrow nearly $70,000, which he never saw again.
Maryanne Riechelmann described sending identical sums from Rutherfurd to Nigeria at about the same time, in November 1998.
But the court also heard from a doctor with 35 years' experience who said Rutherfurd was taking strong painkillers and antidepressants for back problems that were the worst he had seen.
General practitioner Allan Adair said he prescribed Oxazepam, pethidine and numerous other drugs for Rutherfurd, who used to squirm with pain while sitting in his surgery.
He gave his "qualified agreement" when defence lawyers asked whether a cocktail of such drugs could spark an "ecstatic rush" affecting mental judgment, and said severe pain could also affect a person's behaviour.
Dr Adair said that on July 1, 1998, he visited Rutherfurd at home and found him lying in bed choking on vomit, with several empty bottles lying nearby. There was also a letter to the doctor and several others to relatives.
It was "most likely Rutherfurd would have died" had Dr Adair not found him.
Today, the court is expected to hear from German investor Kai Krasemann, who claims to be one of five men ripped off by Rutherfurd.
The man accused of swindling $7 million from his rich mates is said to have tracked down a money manager in the dead of night and thumped on her door, demanding to know why cash had failed to reach Nigeria.
Maryanne Riechelmann, a manager for Worldwide Transfers, said she had no
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