After the initial arrangement to resolve the dispute over an invoice, Gorgovski said he recognised that what they were engaging in was illegal, and they were at risk of being detected.
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However, he said that Helmy believed the government was clueless, and that they would not get caught. “I was telling him, you are going too deep,” Gorgovski said.
Gorgovski, who broke down in tears on several occasions during his appearance in the witness box, said Helmy visited the company’s Wetherill Park offices as regularly as twice a week at stages. “He was like a leech – you couldn’t get rid of him. It felt like he lived at the offices,” he said.
Questioned about why he did not report the illegal arrangement to authorities, Gorgovski detailed how he sought a meeting with an RMS official in 2015 but that he did not feel like he had the chance to reveal the wrongdoing because another engineer turned up.
About $12 million worth of work is alleged to have been awarded to Complete Linemarking in return for Helmy pocketing cash kickbacks from the company.
Avijohn Contracting director Michael Kennedy is questioned at the ICAC hearing on Friday.
The inquiry was also told about approaches Helmy and Transport for NSW procurement officer Peter Le made in 2019 to family business Avijohn Contracting about paying kickbacks in return for work with the agency.
Avijohn Contracting director Michael Kennedy confirmed he met the pair at the Warwick Hotel on three occasions, during which he said Helmy outlined the proposed arrangement and warned that his company risked losing out on work if they did not strike a deal.
Kennedy said the arrangement outlined by Helmy involved Avijohn paying $10,000 for every million dollars of work up to $10 million, and thereafter $20,000 for every million dollars. Asked how Helmy wanted to be paid, Kennedy told the inquiry: “I believe he said, ‘cash is best’.”
He recalled later handing over the first amount of $10,000 to Le in a car park at Rashays restaurant at Lansvale in Sydney’s south-west in May 2020. Earlier this week, the inquiry was told that evidence will show that Le assisted Helmy in most of the allegedly corrupt arrangements.
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The public inquiry is part of an ICAC investigation known as Operation Wyvern, which has already resulted in raids on Helmy’s premises and those who are alleged to have paid him kickbacks.
Last September, the NSW Crime Commission seized gold bullion bars and nuggets and $12,317 in cash from Helmy’s home, as well as a Maserati, $413,000 worth of cryptocurrency held by him, and the equivalent of $8 million in cryptocurrency in a Binance account in the name of his sister.
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