A FORMER Barnsley woman who has spent almost two years in a New Zealand jail having defrauded the country’s transport ministry of $726,000 the equivalent of £418,000 has been told she will be deported to the UK next month.
Joanne Harrison, 52, was sentenced to 43 months in prison in February 2017 after admitting three charges of dishonestly taking or using a document. The Manukau District Court was told Harrison, whose maiden name was Sidebottom and is believed to have attended Darton High School, was employed as a general manager at the ministry in Wellington and was authorised to spend public funds.
However, over the course of more than three years Harrison made false invoices to three fake entities to misappropriate the money into her own accounts.
She then used the money to pay off credit card debts and a mortgage on a house.
At a hearing held last week held at Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility, the country’s parole board approved deportation to the UK.
A report said: “She has been having individual counselling sessions since December 2016 and has undertaken more than 42 sessions. Ms Harrison said that in addition to one-to-one work, she has also participated in workshops with six to eight others. The work has included trauma counselling as well as neuropsychological work to address faulty thinking.
“Ms Harrison does not underestimate the challenges that she will face when she returns to the community. However she sees herself as now being in the strongest position possible to return to the UK and to begin a new life for herself.
“We talked to Ms Harrison about the risks that she will face back in the UK and her ongoing risk to the community. She said that initially she will be supported financially and she plans to investigate re-training in the nutritionist or mindfulness field.
“She said she has never offended in a fraudulent way in the UK and has no convictions there. She said she began thinking of fraudulent offending while residing there but did not offend.
“Despite having used several different names to commit her fraudulent activities, Ms Harrison told the board she plans to use the name Joanne Harrison when she returns. She said that there is an awareness of her offending in the area to which she will be returning because the New Zealand media reports reached that location as well.
“Given the time that it will take to organise Ms Harrison’s deportation she will be released in January 2019 on the standard conditions. Those will be suspended given that she will be immediately deported from New Zealand.”
