Ms Selena Lyons, the former chief executive officer of Riverina Medical and Dental Aboriginal Corporation (RivMed), was today convicted in the Wagga Wagga Local Court of 24 charges of dishonestly misusing her position to gain a personal advantage.
Ms Lyons was found guilty of dishonestly using her position to claim travel expenses that she knew she was not entitled to.
The Court found that on 24 occasions between October 2011 and April 2014 Ms Lyons used her position as CEO of RivMed to authorise payments to herself for travel or accommodation. These payments were either for days that Ms Lyons was not travelling for work purposes, or another organisation had already paid for her travel, accommodation and meals.
The charges were brought by the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations in August 2016 under section 265-25(3)(a) of the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006.
RivMed is a large, well-established medical and dental centre providing high quality and culturally safe health care to Aboriginal people in and around Wagga Wagga, New South Wales. It was first incorporated in 1988.
Ms Lyons is to appear in the Wagga Wagga Local Court for sentencing on 1 February 2018.
The matter was prosecuted by the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions.
Background
See the Registrar’s previous media release of 8 August 2016 (MR1617-04).
Media contact
Lisa Hugg
(02) 6146 4738
ORIC MR1718-14
22 November 2017