'Fall from grace' keeps former Māori King adviser Rangi Whakaruru from prison

Rangi Whakaruru. Photo / File

A fraudster who used his position as the right-hand man of the Māori King to steal $111,000 has narrowly escaped a stretch in prison after a judge said his public "fall from grace" and "loss of mana" was relevant in sentencing.

Rangi Whakaruru, 57, was sentenced at the Auckland District Court after having pleaded guilty to six charges - of obtaining by deception, and lying to Serious Fraud Office investigators - last December.

Whakaruru had worked since 2009 as the "principal private secretary" to King Tūheitia, and the court heard he had manufactured false invoices to induce Tainui - the tribe which funds the King's activities and had grown concerned at the monarch's health issues - into paying for his own private gastric band surgery in 2016.

Judge Ema Aitken addressed Whakaruru and said: "You clearly used your position, your mana and standing, and years of service, to obtain significant personal benefits to yourself."

She said he had not provided any insight to authorities as to the reason for his offending: "The only conclusion available to me is that I am dealing with someone acting dishonestly, not through need, but greed."

Aitken said the starting point for sentencing was three and a half years in prison, but provided reductions for good character, an early guilty plea, and the offer of reparations that saw imposed a final sentence of 12 months home detention, and 300 hours of community service.

SFO prosecutor Todd Simmonds had earlier argued a custodial sentence was required given the collateral damage the offending had caused.

"Harm in a case like this goes much beyond pure financial loss. It goes to significant harm to the reputation and mana of the iwi and Kīngitanga. Those matters are difficult, if not impossible, to quantify - but they are real and tangible," Simmonds said.

Guyon Foley, acting for Whakaruru, said his client had written to King Tūheitia to apologise shortly after pleading guilty and said he had brought "great shame on himself, by his own actions".

Whakaruru remained silent during his sentencing, and left the court at its conclusion to be spirited away to a relative's home in Whakatāne where he'll spend the next 12 months and wear an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet.

The case had been a hot topic in Māoridom, particularly amongst Waikato-Tainui, with both Sir Wira Gardiner and Tukoroirangi Morgan in the public gallery to observe proceedings.

The SFO investigation, and an earlier probe by the Charities Service, had followed an investigation by the Herald into alleged mispending at the King's Office.

Following sentencing, SFO director Julie Read said Whakaruru had "abused his position of trust" and his actions had "compromised the Office of the Māori King".

A rare statement from the Office of the Kīngitanga following the hearing did not mention Whakaruru by name and instead said a "former staff member" had been sentenced after "pleading guilty, in 2019, to serious fraud charges".

The statement said "significant changes" in governance and management had been made in the past year: "We believe we now have processes in place that will prevent any further systemic vulnerabilities."