Airport fraudster sells house to pay back company

The long-serving accounts clerk admitted fraud charges after transferring $1.8 million of the company's money to her own account. Photo / File

An Auckland International Airport worker who admitted fraud charges after transferring $1.8 million of the company's money into her own account has sold her house to pay back her former employer.

Freezing orders were placed over the Epsom home of former accounts clerk Teremoana Kimiangatau's in February after she was sacked from the airport and the NZX-listed company began chasing her over $1.84 million of "unexplained transactions". Bank accounts linked to her were also put on ice by Employment Court Chief Judge Graeme Colgan.

Kimiangatau was pursued by the Serious Fraud Office and the 53-year-old last month pleaded guilty to three charges for obtaining by deception. She transferred $1.8 million of the airport's money into her own account, the SFO said.

Kimiangatau worked for the country's largest listed company for 18 years and made the transfers after changing client bank account numbers to her own within the airport's accounting system, the SFO said last month.

While the asset freeze was initially the subject of suppression orders, these were lifted by Judge Colgan.

That followed the airport asking the judge for Kimiangatau's $1 million, 4-bedroom home to be excluded from the freezing orders.

This was because the house was being sold - so Kimiangatau could make reparations to the airport, Colgan's decision said.

The judge banned any reporting of the woman's address.