Patrick Mitchell was found guilty of 25 counts of stealing on 2 March 2017 and sentenced to eight years in jail by the Tasmanian Supreme Court.
The charges relate to money stolen through 25 separate transactions from a nurse who had accumulated the funds through inheritance and careful savings, reports local newspaper The Advocate.
The thefts happened over a period of four years, during which time Mitchell was an authorised financial services representative of a subsidiary of National Australia Bank (NAB).
He was banned from providing financial services for life by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (Asic), effective from 26 May.
The regulator’s deputy chairman, Peter Kell, said: “Asic will act to remove people from the financial services industry who act dishonestly and breach the trust of their clients.”
Wealth management project
Mitchell’s arrest and ban stemmed from Asic’s wealth management project, which seeks to lift the standards of major financial advice providers.
The project specifically targets Australia’s largest financial advice providers; NAB, Westpac, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), ANZ Bank, AMP and Macquarie.
To date, and in addition to Mitchell, Asic has banned 38 advisers from the financial services industry since the project was launched in October 2014.
