$10 million: Couple on run as cash vanishes

by Abigail Hartevelt abbey.hartevelt@dailypost.co.nz
The Rotorua couple at the centre of the embarrassing $10 million Westpac bank account bungle are believed to have fled overseas with nearly half the money.
The couple, Leo Gao and a girlfriend, are now being hunted by police across the world after Gao applied for a $10,000 overdraft - and up to $10 million was mistakenly paid.
The Daily Post broke the story on Tuesday after learning Westpac staff had mistakenly put a "substantial" amount of money into a bank account and some of it was missing.
The Westpac bungle has been the talk of the town over the past few days.
The case is so sensitive the bank and police are refusing to reveal many details. Police held a press conference in Rotorua yesterday but revealed little more than what was already known.
However, The Daily Post inquiries have revealed Westpac has gone to the High Court and obtained court charging orders of $3.782 million over properties owned by Gao and associates linked with his failed BP Rotorua service station.
The court orders essentially mean the properties, in Rotorua and Auckland, could be used to help repay money which may be claimed by the bank.
The court orders list Gao Hui (also know as Gao Leo), Heights Service Ltd (which owned BP Barnetts on the corner of Old Taupo and Otonga Rds), Zhang Huan Di (also known as Huandi Zhang) among five defendants.
Gao and Mr Zhang were shareholders in Heights Service Ltd. This paper has previously revealed the service station is in receivership.
This is understood to have happened the day after the money was put into the account.
The Daily Post inquiries paint a picture of Gao.
Tania Davis, a director of Zero to 100 Automotive near BP Barnetts, used to regularly see the owner of the service station, whom she knew as "Leo". She said he was a Chinese man who had owned the service station for about two years and was "quite a nice guy".
Mrs Davis said they often got petrol or milk from the service station. He worked there with his New Zealand girlfriend.
There was an Indian staff member there as well.
She was not surprised to see the receivers' notice on the door of the petrol station.
"The quality of the business seemed to be down," she said, adding some of her customers had complained to her about the quality of the service.
Mrs Davis was, however, surprised to hear the owner may have run off with a large amount of money. She thought it was just rumours until she read Tuesday's edition of The Daily Post and said it was "still hard to believe".
Gao's Auckland tenant told The Daily Post he wondered why he hadn't heard from his landlord recently.
Jesse Connop lives in an Eden Terrace house in Auckland owned by Gao. He had no idea his landlord was at the centre of an international manhunt.
"It's unbelievable if it's true," said Mr Connop, a 20-year-old student.
He described his landlord as "somewhat distant", despite keeping in touch with his tenants every two weeks. He said tenants hadn't heard from him in a month, which was unusual.
Detective Senior Sergeant David Harvey of the Rotorua police yesterday said in a statement the police were conducting an investigation into the inappropriate operation of a Westpac Bank business account in Rotorua where a sum of money had been inappropriately withdrawn.
Mr Harvey said the individuals associated with the account were believed to have left New Zealand and police were working with Interpol.
Before reading the statement he said he would not be answering any questions "because of the sensitivities with the bank concerned".
Mr Harvey would not comment when asked if he knew what country the people were in. When The Daily Post asked him why he was not prepared to say how much money was involved he ended the press conference and walked down the street.
Westpac spokesman Craig Dowling said due to court action under way, and the investigation by police, he was unable to comment on any specific details.
Mr Dowling said a significant amount of the sum believed to have been misappropriated had been recovered and further civil and criminal action is under way through which the bank expected to recover more.
"We are pursuing this aggressively as we would in any situation where a crime has apparently taken place."
He said as a result of the incident Westpac's processes had been reviewed and action taken to avoid it happening again.
Banking experts say the transfer of huge amounts of money is easy.
BP spokesman Neil Green said BP Barnetts, which closed after going into receivership on May 8, was an independently owned business.
"From our point of view we are not owed any money. We are working with the receivers pumping the remaining fuel out of the tanks."
Mr Green said he had no idea why the service station went into receivership.
He said the site manager of the service station was Hui Gao, also known as Leo.
On the companies register, Gao is listed as having 40 per cent of the shares and Mr Zhang has 60 per cent of the shares. Gao was listed as the director. It is unclear who or where Mr Zhang is.
Mr Green said it would be unfortunate if the owners were involved in "this case".
"The reality is if these people are the people who have done this thing, it is incidental. It doesn't affect us. We haven't done anything wrong."
Mr Green said as far as he was aware, BP had not been contacted by police. The receivers, Corporate Finance, said the business went into receivership because the owners did not pay their bills.