Property consultant Stephen Gubb jailed after stealing $300,000 from Selwyn District Council

Property consultant Stephen Rolf Gubb has been jailed for defrauding $300,000 from Selwyn District Council.

A Christchurch property consultant who stole $300,000 from Selwyn District Council over eight years has today been jailed for nearly three years.

Stephen Rolf Gubb, 62, was employed by Hughes Developments to sell land, leases, and design and build packages for the local authority's business hub development, Izone.

But the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) found that Gubb, and a co-defendant who has interim name suppression, worked together to fraudulently get commission payments for the sale of land.

A probe by the SFO found that Gubb fraudulently obtained 13 commission payments of about $300,000 from Selwyn District Council between March 2007 and July 2015. He has also admitted to creating a false invoice to obtain $10,500.

Today at Christchurch District Court, he was sentenced after earlier admitting 14 Crimes Act charges of obtaining by deception.

The Crown did not seek a reparation order, with the court hearing that most of the money had been repaid, no thanks to Gubb. However, he had repaid the $10,500 for a false invoice.

Defence counsel Allister Davis said Gubb, who has previously been jailed for a $1.1m fraud in 2003, was "very remorseful" and accepting that he had been "stupid" to embark on a fraudulent scheme after being "given a chance by a friend".

"He has blotted his copybook well and truly," said Davis.

Judge David Saunders described the offending as premeditated and an abuse of trust.

Gubb was jailed for two years and nine months.

SFO director Julie Read said the sentence reflects the seriousness of offending which was "not only deliberate, planned and long running, but a repetition of previous offending".

"Stephen Gubb defrauded a government body of $300,829, took advantage of his position and betrayed the trust his employer had placed in him. Mr Gubb was given an opportunity to rebuild his life following his previous fraud convictions but instead chose to offend again," she said.