chameleon directors charged, page-9

Mining News"
Market riggers get jail time, fine

Friday, November 23, 2007
Kate Haycock

AFTER being found guilty of market rigging, former Perth businessman Dean Scook and ex-stockbroker Jeffrey Braysich have been sentenced to jail and given a suspended sentence.



Gavel

Scook was sentenced to three years in prison, but can be released after 14 months on good behaviour with a $5000 surety.

Braysich was given a suspended sentence of one year imprisonment with a surety of $5000 and a fine of $24,000.

Both men were convicted of creating a false or misleading appearance of active trading in Intrepid Mining in 1998. Intrepid was later known as Cobra Resources and is now called Resource Mining Corp.

Scook, who was found guilty on 158 charges, used multiple accounts through several brokers as well as a pool of traders to trade in Intrepid shares, and would arrange both sides of the transaction. As a result, he was responsible for over 50% of the volume of reported trades in Intrepid shares in the period.

Scook was also charged with making wash trades – which involve no change in beneficial ownership of the shares traded – and matched orders, which are arranged between associated parties to buy and sell shares that substantially match in price and volume.

The charges against Braysich, who was Scook's broker at Paul Morgan Securities, related to trading between two accounts which did not involve a change in beneficial ownership of the shares.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission executive director of enforcement, Jan Redfern, said while cases of market rigging were "particularly difficult to detect and prosecute", the sentences given to Scook and Braysich should be a warning to others.

"Market rigging offences are extremely destructive in that they strike at the very heart of confidence in Australia's financial markets," she said.

"In prosecuting such matters ASIC seeks to ensure investors can trade in a well-regulated market which is transparent and reflects genuine forces of supply and demand