Hawkes Bay Today
  • Hawke's Bay Today home
  • Latest news
  • Sport
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
  • Video
  • Death notices
  • Classifieds

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • On The Up
  • Sport
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Residential property listings
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology

Locations

  • Napier
  • Hastings
  • Havelock North
  • Central Hawke's Bay
  • Tararua

Media

  • Video
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-Editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

Weather

  • Napier
  • Hastings
  • Dannevirke
  • Gisborne

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Hawkes Bay Today

Fast moves to protect clients

Hawkes Bay Today
18 Feb, 2016 11:30 PM2 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Gerald McKay who denies 11 charges, including five of dishonestly using invoices with intent to obtain pecuniary advantage. Photo / Duncan Brown

Gerald McKay who denies 11 charges, including five of dishonestly using invoices with intent to obtain pecuniary advantage. Photo / Duncan Brown

Napier property law firm McKay Hill was all-but shut down in less than a week as the Law Society moved to protect the firm's client funds, the Napier District Court was told yesterday.

Society inspector John Hicks arrived on a late-May Wednesday in 2010 and the next Monday the district Lawyers Standards Committee acted on his interim report and secured the funds.

The investigator was giving evidence on the fourth day of the trial of lawyer Gerald George McKay who denies 11 charges, including five of dishonestly using invoices with intent to obtain pecuniary advantage, five of theft by intentionally and wrongfully dealing with client funds, and one representative charge of criminal breach of trust.

Among discoveries made by Mr Hicks was that monthly Ledger Control Summary Reports filed by the firm with the society regularly misrepresented its position, reporting its Interest in Trust as being in credit when it was regularly in six-figure deficit.

It also discovered the removal of $336,900 from one estate, in 15 separate transactions without any authority from the estate executor, as would have been required under trust fund regulations in the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act. In one case a shortfall from a client's interest had been met by a payment from its own principle, Mr Hicks said.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The investigation also discovered five invoices created just a day earlier, and backdated almost a year, which Mr McKay was to explain would be registered as securities over funds to balance the shortfall. But Mr Hicks said he "smelt a rat" because the invoices were all produced at the same time, were all for large rounded sums, and McKay could provide no evidence of disbursements or other costs against them.

Amounts allegedly stolen from clients total $556,900, while the value of the allegedly false invoices are over $1 million.

The trial enters a fifth day today before Judge Colin Doherty and a jury of eight women and three men who have been told prosecution evidence may be completed on Monday.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Discover more

New Zealand|crime

Hoon terror: Fires and concrete missiles

14 Feb 07:25 PM

Burn-out drivers vandalise car

14 Feb 09:00 PM

'Our justice system stinks'

16 Feb 02:00 AM
Save

    Share this article

Latest from Hawkes Bay Today

Hawkes Bay Today

Motorist dies after four crashes in 40 minutes in Hawke's Bay

Hawkes Bay Today

'We have you surrounded': Police stood down after Hawke's Bay stand-off, search continues

Premium
Hawkes Bay Today

Black Ferns: Tui pair on the big bird for matches in South Africa


Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Hawkes Bay Today

Motorist dies after four crashes in 40 minutes in Hawke's Bay
Hawkes Bay Today

Motorist dies after four crashes in 40 minutes in Hawke's Bay

Some roads remained blocked.

17 Jul 06:02 AM
'We have you surrounded': Police stood down after Hawke's Bay stand-off, search continues
Hawkes Bay Today

'We have you surrounded': Police stood down after Hawke's Bay stand-off, search continues

17 Jul 04:06 AM
Premium
Premium
Black Ferns: Tui pair on the big bird for matches in South Africa
Hawkes Bay Today

Black Ferns: Tui pair on the big bird for matches in South Africa

17 Jul 04:00 AM


Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

06 Jul 09:47 PM
NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • Hawke's Bay Today e-edition
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Subscribe to the Hawke's Bay Today
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • NZME Events
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP