Legion of Honour recipient appears in court for WW1 brick scam
A NSW woman who used funds from a charity she co-founded purporting to sell bricks to establish a memorial at the Pozieres battlefield in France for her own personal use has avoided a prison term for the theft.
Instead, Yvonne Mary Hall, who is a recipient of France’s prestigious Legion of Honour, was ordered to complete a 16-month intensive corrections order by a magistrate at Coffs Harbour Local Court on Monday.
The 69-year-old had earlier pleaded guilty to two counts of dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception and one charge of using a false document to influence exercise of public duty.
The Pozieres Remembrance Association, which Hall co-founded in 2010 and acted as the secretary of, claims to have sold over 4200 bricks for $50 apiece - raising $210,000 ($NZD 224,000) in total - since 2014.
The funds were meant to go towards a memorial honouring the 6800 Anzacs who died during the battles at the French village during the First World War.
Hall instead made 143 transactions - withdrawing approximately $140,000 - to pay for her own everyday living expenses, as well as a gambling addiction and online shopping habit.
“The breach of trust was obviously very significant indeed. She was in a position of secretary of the organisation and she directly breached that trust,” magistrate Ian Rodgers said.
When passing down the sentence, Mr Rodgers acknowledged she had repaid all but $8052 of the stolen funds.
Along with the corrections order, he ordered Hall to complete 100 hours of community service and repay the money owed.
Hall’s lawyer said the association had paid to ensure the inscribed bricks were still manufactured, and it was the defence’s understanding that the bricks were en-route to France by boat and would be placed on the site soon.
Jacqueline Kennedy bought a brick to honour her great-uncle Percy Smythe, who fought in and survived Pozieres.
Sitting in the public gallery during the hearing, she had purchased the brick in 2015 and asked the Department of Fair Trading to investigate after wondering what had happened and where the money went.
She said she was satisfied with Monday’s sentence and that she was happy Hall was being “treated like the criminal that she is”.
“I always knew that it would be a non-custodial sentence because of her age and health, and does like to play on that, but I’m very satisfied with the seriousness with which the judge took the case and handed down the sentence,” Ms Kennedy said outside court.
Hall was awarded the Legion of Honour, France’s highest order of merit, for raising awareness of the Battle of Pozieres and strengthening Australian-French relations.
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