Brisbane Magistrates Court in Queensland. Credit:richard sowersby / Alamy Stock Photo On December 14 Gillespie was fined $3000. No conviction was recorded, there was no community service imposed. "It really does require a sentence to be imposed that will provide adequate deterrence to ensure that investors, who these days often are retired people who have no other means of earning a livelihood except for their investments ... are adequately protected," McLennan told a gobsmacked court. Victims including Leonie and Peter Crowe, CBA whistleblower Jeff Morris and senator John Williams (who called a parliamentary inquiry into CBA's financial planning division) were equally surprised. On social media there were a number of reflections about white-collar crime and the stiff penalties meted out to blue-collar workers if they break the law.

Magistrate McLennan's explanation and justification for her sentence is worth a read. She says Gillespie was "relatively young" at the time of the offences – he was 30 – and had no criminal history either prior to the "incident" or post committing the "offences". She said his career had been forged in financial planning, a career that he subsequently lost for life when he got caught and was then banned for life from that profession by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. "That is a significant penalty that he has already endured." She said she also took into account that there had been media attention – it was Fairfax Media that first brought Gillespie to public attention in 2013 – and that there had been some "difficulty in obtaining employment", even though he now had employment. If a crime has been committed and guilt proven then why wasn't a conviction recorded? Leonie Crowe

The magistrate noted he now had a family and "recording a conviction will pose difficulties in obtaining further employment. So I certainly take that into account. " But mostly she felt that the forgery wasn't done for personal financial benefit. "There is no allegation that is the result of these – this forgery, he financially benefited, unless I take into account the fact that he was receiving a wage from his employer." Leonie and Peter Crowe were victims of Ricky Gillespie and the CBA. They went to the bank in 2007 and invested $1 million of savings that they had accrued through hard work. Within two years of receiving advice from Gillespie they had lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. The bank told them it was due to the global financial crisis.

They would later discover that their signatures had been forged. Crowe says after reading the judgment, which included 33 offences involving 18 clients, she wondered if that included them because they identified over 20 documents alone. "I don't know exactly how many there were in our file because the bank wasn't forthcoming with that exact info. They sent us a selection of docs," she says. Crowe says forging signatures was only part of the complaints made to the state manager at CBA. It would take years of battling the CBA before the Crowes finally received compensation and start getting on with their lives.

According to the judgment, forging signatures was motivated by a need to cut corners. "The defendant was primarily motivated by an intention to cover up his failures to comply with the Commonwealth Financial Planning compliance policies and avoid disciplinary action or dismissal." CBA was forced to pay out more than $2 million in compensation to 33 affected clients of Gillespie and refund $88,000 for ongoing advice fees and interest, to 22 of his clients. Gillespie was one of a number of planners in CBA's Commonwealth Financial Planning division that would be banned after Jeff Morris blew the whistle to ASIC in October 2008. He and other planners, including "dodgy" Don Nguyen, hit the headlines in June 2013 when Fairfax Media launched a series of stories into a scandal and cover-up at CBA's financial planning arm and the failure of ASIC to act promptly.

It resulted in a Senate inquiry that recommended a royal commission. Internal memos obtained by Fairfax showed that CBA had become aware of the forgery allegations at least nine months before allowing him to resign and cite personal reasons. A resignation instead of termination enabled him to go and work for two other financial planning operations before ASIC banned him in November 2012, almost four years after he was caught red-handed forging signatures. A compliance report on Gillespie dated October 16, 2008 advised "issues of suspected irregularities" in the signatures of four of Gillespie's clients. Another document revealed another 10 signatures had been identified as possibly fraudulent. In one case, the forged signature was used to obtain a one-off commission and create an ongoing fee of 0.83 per cent of the value of an investment portfolio, documents show. Planners were indoctrinated to focus on sales and fees at any cost. It was about targets and statistics and increasing revenue. Planners also benefited as the more products they sold, the more commissions they were paid.

ASIC banned Gillespie for life in 2012 on the grounds he had forged clients' signatures, engaged in deceptive and misleading conduct and had overcharged clients. In 2013 Fairfax Media tracked down Gillespie in Queensland, where he denied he had forged signatures, or charged excessive fees or offered inappropriate advice. "There is no smoking gun here," he said. "It was templated models created by Colonial First State. Not by me personally." Gillespie was right. There was a boiler room culture and targets set. But at the end of the day advisers who sold more products earned more commissions. Leonie Crowe poses an interesting question.

Loading "If a crime has been committed and guilt proven then why wasn't a conviction recorded?" Indeed.