The accused mastermind of a kickback scandal at NSW’s transport agency sent text messages to his associates showing photographs of large bundles of cash he had received from a road contractor, but he told his alleged right-hand man he pocketed less than he actually received on one occasion, an inquiry has heard.
In his seventh day in the witness box, sacked Transport for NSW official Ibrahim Helmy was grilled about his improper dealings with Sydney company Kerway Asphalting, which gained about $25 million of work from Transport for NSW between 2019 and last year.
Ibrahim Helmy is alleged to have pocketed $11.5 million in kickbacks, including bundles of cash and gold bullion.Credit: Aresna Villanueva
Under questioning at the Independent Commission Against Corruption inquiry, Helmy accepted on Monday that he personally received a total of $686,000 from Kerway director Wayne Harrison between September 2019 and May 2024.
The bundles of cash he was handed by Harrison on 14 occasions at locations ranging from a pub to service stations included $100,000 on New Year’s Eve in 2022, a further $100,000 on September 19, 2023, and $90,000 on May 9 last year.
Helmy kept records of the payments from Harrison in return for work from Transport for NSW at inflated prices on a spreadsheet saved to a computer seized from his Merrylands home in September last year.
After he was handed $100,000 in cash on New Year’s Eve in 2022 at Kerway’s Sydney Mini-Crete site in Seven Hills, Helmy messaged his close friend, developer Adam Taki. Helmy told him: “Mate I just got paid a nice lil $100 today lol. I’m gona spend it all tonight.”
Sacked Transport for NSW official Ibrahim Helmy appears in the witness box at the ICAC inquiry.Credit: ICAC
Taki responded: “It’s hard to spend that much.”
Helmy later added: “Yea just a lil friendly 100 lol. Next week I need to meet up with a few more.”
He clarified to the inquiry on Monday that his reference to $100 in the WhatsApp message was to the $100,000 he had received from Harrison, while his remarks about meeting a “few more” referred to other contractors.
The ICAC is investigating allegations that Helmy was the mastermind behind corrupt relationships with nine companies that were paid at least $343 million in contracts by Transport for NSW in return for kickbacks.
He is accused of pocketing $11.5 million in kickbacks – including bundles of cash and gold bullion – from the contractors in return for their being awarded the work on the state’s roads.
Kerway Asphalting director Wayne Harrison appears at the ICAC’s public inquiry in August.
Helmy repeatedly told the inquiry on Monday that he did not “physically count” the hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash he received from Harrison despite ICAC counsel assisting Rob Ranken, SC, putting to him that it was nonsense and noting that he had two money counting machines.
However, Helmy said he counted the cash he had received by the number of rubber bands that bound the various sums of cash.
Ranken questioned how he could quantify the amount of cash he had received from Harrison by the number of rubber bands.
“I’m just suggesting to you that it’s a nonsense that your approach to counting the amount of money you receive consisted of counting a number of rubber bands,” Ranken told him.
Helmy was also grilled about whether he would give cash to Taki from the amounts he had received so that his friend could use it to pay contractors on his construction projects.
After receiving $100,000 from Harrison on September 19, 2023, Helmy sent a WhatsApp message to Taki saying: “I met up with Wayne today quickly lol. Got some dirty old notes I need to get rid of when u need lol.”
Shortly afterwards, Taki replied: “We can give it to the Renderer lol.”
After initially denying the proposition, he accepted that the two of them were suggesting in their WhatsApp exchange that the money from Harrison could be used to pay Taki’s renderer.
Earlier on Monday, Helmy was initially unsure that he paid his alleged right-hand man at Transport for NSW, Peter Le, any cash or money that had been derived from Kerway.
However, a short time later, Helmy said there were at least two occasions where he had met his Transport for NSW colleague to give him part of the cash he had received from Harrison.
After being shown a WhatsApp message exchange in November 2020 that he had with Le, Helmy also accepted it was possible he may have misrepresented that he had received $10,000 from Harrison when in fact he had been handed $20,000.
In his exchanges with both Le and Taki, Helmy sent photos of bundles of cash he received from Harrison.
Under intense questioning, Helmy also accepted that former Transport for NSW officer Katya Wang, with whom he had had a romantic relationship, did know that he was receiving money from Harrison. He said Wang helped him count cash that he had received on one occasion.
After four months on the run, Helmy was discovered by detectives hiding in a cupboard in a unit block in Lakemba in south-western Sydney on September 26. He remains in custody apart from his appearances at the ICAC inquiry.
The public inquiry into the kickbacks is part of an ICAC investigation known as Operation Wyvern. It is the fourth into corruption in procurement processes at Transport for NSW since 2019. Hearings are scheduled to continue until the end of the month.
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