Luxury holidays and lavish parties: The 'besties' who defrauded a bank of millions of dollars

Helen Mary Rosamond and Rosemary Rogers enjoyed lives of luxury thanks to millions of dollars stolen from one of Australia's big four banks. Here's what they did.

'Besties' Helen Mary Rosamond and Rosemary Rogers will both spend years behind bars over a brazen scheme that saw an Australian bank fleeced out of millions. Source: AAP

Two Australian women spent millions of dollars on lavish overseas holidays, home renovations, boats and cars, living a life of luxury for years.

Now, they've been jailed over fraud and corrupt benefits and are set to spend years behind bars.

Here's what we know.

What did they spend the money on?

Helen Mary Rosamond defrauded more than $19 million from the National Australia Bank (NAB) between 2013 and 2018 with the help of Rosemary Rogers, former chief-of-staff to NAB chief executives.

The two women met at a conference in Hong Kong and became close friends, referring to each other as "bestie" in text messages.

Helen Mary Rosamond was found guilty of 90 fraud charges in November. Source: AAP / Bianca De Marchi

They spent extravagantly and lived lavish lifestyles through their fraudulent activities.

Rosamond reportedly spent hundreds of thousands on home renovations, landscaping and interior design, took luxury holidays overseas, and spent $40,000 on a party.

For her part in the scheme, Rogers received a new house, a BMW, a boat, expensive holidays to the United States and Europe, and other benefits, Rosamond's trial heard.

Extravagant birthday parties for her family members were processed under "Project Outlaw", a code term used for the fraudulent activities.

How did they defraud NAB?

Rosamond falsified and inflated invoices from her event management company Human Group, which began conducting legitimate work for NAB in 2006, before she began to defraud the bank.

The company was paid more than $118 million over 12 years, with $54 million paid in the offending period from 2013 until early 2018.

In November, a jury found Rosamond guilty of 90 fraud charges, finding she gave corrupt benefits to Rogers and obtained or attempted to obtain financial advantage by deception.

On Thursday, she was sentenced to 15 years in prison with a non-parole period of eight years.

Rogers pleaded guilty to corruptly receiving benefits and is serving a maximum prison sentence of eight years with a non-parole period of four years and four months.

Former NAB employee Rosemary Rogers has been sentenced to a maximum of eight years in prison. Source: AAP / Dan Himbrechts

Project codes for legitimate NAB business were used in Human Group's accounting software for fraudulent transactions.

The money was then drawn down to become the company's revenue.

Rogers ensured contracts were extended with Human Group and pay its inflated invoices, and had a delegated authority to approve spending of up to $20 million.

NAB became aware of the fraud thanks to a whistleblower.

Rogers resigned following the whistleblower report, while Rosamond made another attempt to defraud the bank of more than $3.3 million.

She was also found guilty of attempting to fraudulently obtain more than $500,000 by doctoring emails and inflating invoices for Christmas parties for retail property group Vicinity Centres.