A corrupt clerk at the Inland Revenue Department sold debt collectors the private details of up to 850 taxpayers before she and a colleague were discovered.
The sacked clerk, 31-year-old Sopo Matagi, plied her illegal trade for two years and was caught only after she stole thousands of dollars' worth of cheques from citizens trying to pay off their tax arrears.
The heavily pregnant Manukau woman was jailed for nine months when she appeared in the Auckland District Court yesterday. Judge Phil Gittos said the crimes struck at the very heart of the public service and eroded its integrity. Matagi used her position at the department's Manukau office to sell the names, addresses and phone numbers of taxpayers to three debt collectors for $10 each, from August 1995 to 1998. The collectors used the information to swoop on debtors.
Matagi later admitted 102 charges of corruptly disclosing official information and two counts of using documents. The debt collectors are due to appear in court later this year.
Late yesterday the Privacy Commissioner, Bruce Slane, said he had been waiting for the case to finish, and expected to launch an investigation in the next few days.
He said Government departments that held private information had to protect it with reasonable safeguards.
Details revealed in court show that Matagi was caught in September 1998 after she stole a $659 cheque from one taxpayer and used correction fluid to alter another cheque, worth $5803. The resulting furore sparked an investigation that unearthed another clerk at the Manukau office dealing in taxpayer details.
That worker, Leonie Helen Feterika, was given 80 hours' community service and a suspended prison term after admitting 19 charges.
The Manukau department's investigation team leader, Chris Stevens, said his staff investigated its Auckland operations after the clerks were exposed. Two fulltime investigators spent months ploughing through phone records stretching back 21/2 years for the whole Auckland region, and checks were made into all calls made to collection agencies.
All staff were cleared - apart from Matagi and Feterika - and the department later installed a system to monitor phone calls.
"We are more than happy that we have caught everyone," he said. "This sentence should also be a deterrent."
Matagi's lawyer, Kahungunu Barron-Afeaki, said debt collectors had preyed on his client's weaknesses. All money from her crimes was used to help her family and church.
But crown prosecutor Mark Treleaven said Matagi sold details almost every week while she was working and earned thousands of dollars from the collectors. The privacy of between 592 and 850 taxpayers was violated.
Clerk who sold tax details gets jail
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