By Cam Lucadou-Wells
A highly-paid former manager on the Sky Rail project has been jailed for his part in work rorts worth more than $160,000.
Kory Oxley, from Berwick, was on a $185,000 salary as a 35-year-old Land Lease foreman on the Caulfield-Dandenong leg of the Level Crossings Removal project in 2017-’18.
He pleaded guilty to orchestrating a time-sheets rort in which workers were paid on non-entitled days off – or what the conspirators called “cheese days”.
Over 12 months, he pocketed about half of the $90,328 racket.
Oxley used the proceeds to buy a $24,000 caravan and an $11,500 boat and trailer.
In sentencing on 13 August, County Court judge Kevin Doyle noted that some workers felt pressured to join the ‘cheese’ scheme.
They were told that “you’re either part of the ship or you’ll be thrown off”, Judge Doyle said.
“You were managing these workers and you had power over them. You roped them into your criminal conduct.
“You were spreading a culture of dishonesty in that workplace.”
Oxley also organised 26 project laborers to do work on his co-offender and boss Steven Winter’s home in Selby over a two-day weekend in August 2018.
Among their multitude of tasks were painting an outbuilding, building a large fence and moving a pile of wood.
Oxley authorised for the team to be paid on the company dollar.
Though Oxley didn’t reap the benefit, the rort wouldn’t have occurred without his abuse of power, Judge Doyle said.
“I don’t accept that you were somehow prevailed upon to offend in this way by Mr Winter.”
Oxley’s “serious” offending was aggravated by repeatedly breaching his position of trust over an extended period.
At the time he was not complying with a community corrections order designed to address his drug use.
Oxley partly blamed his meth use for his offending, Judge Doyle said.
He noted Oxley’s early guilty plea and lack of previous criminal deceptions. If Oxley could stop using meth, his rehabilitation prospects were “reasonably good”, Judge Doyle said.
The New Zealand citizen grew up amid family violence, drugs, crime and alcohol, and being “shuffled” among relatives’ homes.
Jail would weigh heavily on Oxley, who was likely to suffer high levels of separation anxiety. So too the possibility of deportation under the Commonwealth Migration Act’s ‘character test’.
Oxley was jailed for nine months, followed by a 15-month community corrections order.
The supervised order included 100 hours of unpaid work as well as mental health, drug and alcohol treatment.
The boat, trailer and caravan were forfeited, and Oxley was ordered to pay back the remainder of the money.
