Lawyer and Former Officers Linked with Members Alliance and Benchmark Group Facing 72 Criminal Charges, Says ASIC

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) announced today that lawyer and former company officers associated with the collapse of the Members Alliance and Benchmark groups in 2016 and 2017 faced 72 criminal charges.

The Members Alliance and Benchmark groups allegedly operated property investment vehicles on the Gold Coast, offering financial advice to retail investors. In July 2016, eighteen group companies were placed into liquidation with a $26 million debt owing to the ATO, according to ASIC.

The defendants include Mr Richard Marlborough, Mr Colin MacVicar, and Mr David Domingo, who were at various times directors of companies in the Members Alliance, and Mr Liam Young, a director of five Benchmark companies set up following the collapse of the Members Alliance in mid-2016, and Mr John Ramsden, who acted as a solicitor for the Members Alliance.

Specifically, Mr Marlborough has been charged with:

• 21 counts of trading while insolvent;

• 10 counts of dishonestly using his position as a director;

• one count of disposing of property after becoming (or was about to be) a bankrupt; and

• one count of fraud.

Mr MacVicar has been charged with:

• 13 counts of trading while insolvent;

• one count of dishonestly using his position as a director; and

• one count of disposing of property after becoming (or was about to be) a bankrupt.

Mr Young has been charged with:

• four counts of trading while insolvent; and

• ​five counts of dishonestly using his position as a director.

Mr Domingo has been charged with seven counts of trading while insolvent.

Mr Ramsden has been charged with aiding Mr Marlborough, Mr MacVicar and Mr Young in their alleged directors duties offences. He faces eight counts of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring the commission of an offence in contravention of the Corporations Act.

The matter has been listed for a mention hearing on 26 November 2021.