A former security company employee who stole more than $530,000 from four Canberra ATMs in one night gambled the money in multiple transactions, including a $53,000 bet on an AFL premiership.
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Salesi Latu Toumo'ua, 29, pleaded guilty to theft, money laundering and four burglary charges stemming from his crimes when he appeared before Justice John Burns in the ACT Supreme Court on Thursday.
Court documents said Toumo'ua worked as an ATM technician at G&A Security Services and was acting supervisor when he took keys to numerous St George bank ATMs from a safe at the company's Weston office one night in May 2013.
He then drove to Charnwood shops, where he used the keys to open the security door to a St George bank ATM bunker and took more than $211,830 from two machines.
Toumo'ua drove to Mitchell, where he stole $246,150 from an ATM, and later to Wanniassa, where he pocketed $73,350 from another machine.
He is also alleged to have stolen $244,000 from an ATM at Riverside Plaza in Queanbeyan that same night. However, no charges have been laid over that incident.
A few days later, the offender hired a car from Canberra Airport and drove the stolen cash to Melbourne, where he stashed it in a storage unit.
He went on to launder the money through a lengthy string of transactions, largely using a Tabcorp telephone betting account, over the next five months.
He also taught his younger brother, Daniel Toumo'ua, 24, to gamble and directed him to carry out numerous transactions.
In one transaction, the offender bought 28 tickets to bet $52,758 on Hawthorn Football Club to win that year's AFL premiership in September. He pocketed $152,249 when the team won the match.
Court documents said Toumo'ua previously told his brother he wanted to place a bet on the team to win, but it couldn't be done in one go, because "they're going to ask too much, putting in ID and a lot of stuff like that".
In separate transactions, he gambled $71,461 in cash at nine different Tabcorp outlets in Melbourne in 24 hours.
Another day, he lost more than $16,000 while gambling at Melbourne's Crown Casino.
In September, police searched the storage unit and seized items including a briefcase, more than 40 Tabcorp betting tickets, $193,782 in cash and a receipt from the Charnwood ATM.
Fingerprints matching Toumo'ua's were found on the briefcase and tickets.
Salesi Toumo'ua's partner, Siutaisa Helen Schaaf, 29, pleaded guilty to money laundering on Thursday.
According to court documents, she deposited more than $28,000 in numerous transactions into her own bank account in the five months to September 2013.
The pair will be sentenced in May.
Daniel Toumo'ua in 2015 pleaded guilty to possessing proceeds of crime in the ACT Magistrates Court and was placed on a good behaviour order.
