The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has succeeded in obtaining court orders preventing an unauthorised financial business, the ‘Federal State Bank of Australia’, from calling itself and acting like a ‘bank’.
Justice Susan Keifel in the Federal Court in Brisbane ordered that Donald Cameron and Darryl John Wheeley be restrained from using the word ‘bank’ after evidence was put to the court that hundreds of thousands of dollars in fake currency and cheques were being passed off as legitimate and that the word ‘bank’ had been used illegally.
The phoney ‘bank’ was supposedly an institution of the so-called ‘Independent Sovereign State of Australia’. Donald Cameron is the self-styled Attorney-General and Chief Justice of that supposed country, as well as being the Archbishop of the ‘Church of Love and Peace’. Evidence presented by APRA to the court showed that:
- a total of 12 transactions have been identified where fake currency and cheques purporting to be valued at over $500,000 were attempted to be used as legitimate payment for various transactions including payment of rent, printing, telephones, the discharging of mortgages and legal fees;
- the ‘cheques’ were presented by unsuspecting recipients to various bank branches in Queensland, Sydney and Perth, none of which was honoured;
- the unauthorised bank and affiliated institutions operate out of a home in suburban Moorooka in Brisbane, which is the subject of a mortgage foreclosure;
- Cameron was declared a vexatious litigant by the Supreme Court of Queensland in March 1996; and
- Cameron had previously failed to address an APRA demand that he stop using the words ‘bank’, ‘banker’, ‘banking’ or any similar words or phrases in relation to the business in contravention of section 66 of the Banking Act 1959 (Banking Act).
The court ordered Cameron and Wheeley to stop using the word ‘bank’; to not advertise, represent or state that they will carry on banking business; to not issue or be in any way involved in issuing any purported cheque or negotiable instrument drawn on the account of the ‘Federal State Bank’; and to not issue any bill or note for the payment of money.
In the proceedings, APRA filed court documents detailing its investigation and containing numerous examples of breaches of the Banking Act, including affidavits from many small business owners who had received the fake currency and cheques as purported payment for their services and whose debts remain unpaid.
The Banking Act prohibits anyone from conducting a banking business without the appropriate authority from APRA. It also prohibits the use of words that connote the carrying on of a banking business.
The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) is the prudential regulator of the financial services industry. It oversees banks, credit unions, building societies, general insurance and reinsurance companies, life insurance, friendly societies, and most members of the superannuation industry. APRA is funded largely by the industries that it supervises. It was established on 1 July 1998. APRA currently supervises institutions holding approximately $2.5 trillion in assets for 20 million Australian depositors, policyholders and superannuation fund members.
Media and industry inquiries only:
Stuart Snell, Head of Public Affairs
Australian Prudential Regulation Authority
Telephone: 02 9210 3384
Mobile: 0407 250 276
All other inquiries:
APRA Contact Centre 1300 131 060
