ACT Policing is reviewing the Brumbies' controversial sale of its Griffith headquarters and subsequent move to the University of Canberra in Bruce, with the club revealing it had uncovered "anomalies" in multiple transactions related to the process.
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Brumbies chief executive officer Michael Jones said the club, with the Australian Rugby Union. had jointly referred the matter to ACT Policing on Wednesday because it needed to explore the possibility of criminal charges being laid.
ACT Policing confirmed it had received the referral and was assessing it but would not make any further comment.
Behind-the-scenes investigations of the club's dealings between 2009 and 2013 have already been undertaken over the past six to nine months by the Brumbies themselves as well as by the ARU and KPMG's forensic accounting arm, which ultimately gave the Brumbies several options, including that the matter be referred to police.
Mr Jones said the entire inquiry had nothing to do with the current operations of the club, no money was missing, there'd been no embezzlement, the Brumbies had not gone broke, no sponsors were involved and no current staff member had been implicated in any way. Nevertheless, the board had serious concerns.
"Just prima facie, it's serious enough for us to take it to the police," he said.
Mr Jones would not specify what the anomalies were and what kind of transactions were involved other than to say the investigation was related to a series of transactions and agreements which occurred between 2009 and 2013 and were linked to the Brumbies' sale of the former headquarters in Griffith for $11.375 million and the subsequent move to the University of Canberra in Bruce.
When asked if they were credit card or bank transactions, Mr Jones said: "No, I can't go into that.
"Suffice to say over the period of 2009 to 2013, there were a lot of transactions."
It's understood KPMG Forensic looked at 50,000 emails and 45,000 pages of documents as part of its investigation which had started around Easter after it was engaged by the Brumbies.
"The KPMG report identified a number of unanswered questions in the transactions and agreements, and the board determined there was no alternative but to act in accordance with corporations law and refer the matter to the police," Mr Jones said.
"I want to reassure our partners, stakeholders, players, staff and members that these matters took place over two years ago and do not relate to our current on-field, commercial operations or governance arrangements."
Brumbies chairman Robert Kennedy said that the Brumbies board, along with the ARU, "adopted the highest possible level of corporate governance and transparency and it is with these standards in mind that this action today has been taken".
"Any indications of improper dealings are taken extremely seriously and investigated fully," he said. "In this case, having exhausted our internal powers of investigation and on the advice of independent forensic investigators, KPMG, we were left with some questions still unanswered and referred the issue to the appropriate authorities.
"The matter involved is in the years past and I have full confidence in the current board and management and am confident it will not impact on the current or future operations of the Brumbies."
Former Brumbies chief executive officer Andrew Fagan, now CEO of the Adelaide Football Club, was in charge of the Brumbies during the period under investigation.
Mr Jones said it would be "up to the police" to decide if Mr Fagan had to help their investigations in any way and he had not personally raised the anomalies with Mr Fagan.
Mr Fagan was asked about the police review at a press conference for the Crows on Thursday.
"I haven't been contacted and I'm not sure whether I will be," Mr Fagan said.
"Certainly I'm not across any of the details. So therefore it would be really difficult for me to comment."
Mr Jones said the Brumbies had not been reacting to a complaint or a tip-off from any third party but the inquiries had been sparked from him reviewing documents after he took over as CEO in January.
"It was uncovered, weirdly enough, as a housekeeping issue because the organisation, prior to my arrival, had moved from the AIS to here [at UC] and we were just sorting out a range of documentation and filing and as part of getting my feet under the table, I looked at a few documents and thought, 'Oh, that's a bit unusual' and then once you started peeling back a few layers of it, more questions started to be asked," he said.
"I initially went to our lawyers who looked at the documents and then reported to the board that I had some concerns, just what had transpired from a governance perspective and they agreed and that's when we took it to the ARU.
"Then we agreed to have a deeper look because we believed we might be just boxing at shadows and we're not an investigative authority and that's when the KPMG component came into it."
Mr Jones said he couldn't detail what the anomalies were because "that's the key part in the police assessment".
"That assessment phase will determine, 'Is there any wrongdoing?' Or, 'Are there any sort of issues that need to be investigated further?' They'll also look at whether there's any activities that require any further action," he said.
"They've indicated that assessment phase could take a couple of months. So from our perspective, at the Brumbies, this was a board decision to pass this on [to the police] because transparency, good governance, is something that we want to maintain.
"And having uncovered these sort of anomalies, we felt that the best course of action, because we're not an investigative organisation was to pass this on."
Mr Jones said he understood there would be "a lot of innuendo" around the board's decision.
"I do not think it will affect the future of the club at all other than dealing with the media and the publicity and the possibility of the brand being tarnished. It doesn't affect us financially. We're not expecting any retrospective windfall out of it, that's not why we're doing it," he said.
"But I have to say, this is a serious matter. It's not a flippant thing. We've taken our time because inevitably people will draw conclusions about individuals or the organisations. We took our time because we had to be confident we'd done everything right from our side "
It's just the latest chapter in what has been a controversy-plagued decision by the Brumbies to sell off its former training and administration headquarters in Austin Street in Griffith for development as residential units.
The Brumbies first revealed its plans to sell off and develop the land for about 150 units in 2009, initially hoping to develop a new headquarters on the Griffith Oval next-door. Members of the community were outraged, not only because of the likely size of any residential development but also the prospect of development encroaching on the oval, which was ultimately granted heritage protection in 2010.
Then sustainable development minister Simon Corbell earlier in 2013 used his call-in powers to approve the Brumbies' plans for a 131-unit development on the site.
The site was sold to in 2013 to a developer for $11.375 million, then CEO Fagan heralding the sale as a chance for the club to clear its debts and secure its move to UC which would be its home for at least the next 40 years.
However, by the next year, The Canberra Times reported that the Brumbies had only about $2 million from the Griffith sale in the bank and had posted a financial loss of $1.07 million for the year.
The Amaya apartments are now under construction at the site, developed by the Amalgamated Property Group.
It was announced in 2012 that the Brumbies would move to the University of Canberra campus in Bruce and be part of a new sports hub, the club contributing $5 million to the construction of the facility.
Mr Jones said plans at the time for $4 million from the Griffith sale to be invested in a Brumbies Rugby Provident Fund to provide for the future funding of ACT rugby had been shelved for the meantime. He said none of the $4 million was missing but had been used elsewhere by the Brumbies. The fund was not the subject of the investigation.
"Conceptually [the fund is] something we want to do but there's no point putting some money away if we need the cash flow to operate," he said.
The current financial state of the Brumbies would not be fully revealed until the end of its financial year on September 30 and the tabling of the financial results to the board on November 25 and the annual general meeting on or about December 14. Next year would be bolstered by a new sponsorship deal with Aquis, owner of Casino Canberra, worth more than $8 million over six years.
"We will have a relatively ugly financial result this year but the board approved the budget earlier this week, which is the first time in the history of the Brumbies, to my knowledge, that we approved a full-year budget before the commencement of the next and it's extremely detailed," Mr Jones said.
"It's reporting a very healthy budget and a very healthy cash flow [for next year]."
University of Canberra vice-chancellor Professor Stephen Parker said in a statement that the Brumbies had informed him of the police assessment.
"Whilst sorry to hear about these developments, Professor Parker does not believe that they will affect the strong and growing academic and research relationship with the Brumbies," the statement said.
"This collaboration has seen the creation of scholarships for high-performing young rugby players to study an undergraduate degree at the university, as well as honours students doing internships with the Brumbies' coaching and performance analysis teams, resulting in employment both in Australia and internationally.
"Some of our researchers are also working together with Brumbies players to test accurately for concussion to ensure the protection of their long-term health.
"The university will not be making any further statement at this stage."
