Fraud Summarised

Fraud Summary:

There needs to be actual fraud, personal dishonesty or moral turpitude lie at the heart of ss 42 and 43 - Assets Co v Mere Roihi. Pyramid Building Society v Scorpion Hotels: also must be brought home to the person whose registered title is impeached (or a person acting on its behalf). In that case, the mortgagee had an honest belief that the mortgage was true, despite its failure to check information.Shultz v Corwill Properties Pty Ltd: Knowledge of fraud by an agent must be brought home to the principal aka bank officer to the bankAssets Co v Mere - wilful blindness constitutes fraud! Knowing something is dodgy and doing nothing about it is fraud!!The crucial element of fraud in the statutory sense is actual dishonesty or moral turpitude on the part of the person taking the benefit of the registration e.g. the bankFraud must be operative: Ferguson v Bank of SA - helping someone get a loan is not fraud.The mortgagee had an honest belief that the mortgage was true, despite its failure to check information actually in its possession that would have revealed it was false - Pyramid Building Society v Scorpion HotelsS 87 of the TLA: states that a mortgagee must take reasonable steps to verity the authority and identity of the person executing the mortgage as the RP of the interest being mortgage.was this done in the question?

False Attestation Summary:

Meaning: a solicitor for or an employee of a person taking the benefit of the registration attests on a registered instrument that they saw the document signed in their presence, when this is false.Person putting the document forward for registration must show to have knowledge of the false attestation or somehow be directly involved in it.AGC v De Jager: constituted fraud wilful blindness, as Mr. French told AGC that he did not witness the signature but was sent to the path to registration.Russo v Bendigo Building Society: law clerk attested the signature, no evidence of dishonesty or moral turpitude as she did not know she was putting a mortgage forward on the path to registrationGraic v ANZ Banking Group : impersonator case, not fraudulent the bank officer did not know of the dishonestMacquarie Bank v Sixty Fourth Throne: K signed the mortgage as director - no authority to do so! Failure to obtain actual knowledge in the circumstances was negligent, but not fraudulent.