A glamorous lawyer and daughter of a controversial property developer accused of using fake contracts to secure a $150m loan has faced court.
Ashlyn Nassif, 27, is accused of falsifying $10.5m in pre-sale contracts for the development of the $900m Sky View apartment complex in northwest Sydney.
The partner of law firm EA Legal is yet to enter pleas after she was charged with dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception and publishing false or misleading material.
She was granted bail in March with $2.6m secured by her family with initially strict bail conditions.
But now, those conditions have been relaxed.
Wearing a black fur coat, Nassif appeared at Burwood Local Court, whereMagistrate Vivien Margaret Swain relaxed her bail conditions.
The court heard her 6am-12am curfew was scrapped and she is required to report to Burwood Police Station five times a week instead of daily — no longer needing to do so on weekends.
Magistrate Grogan earlier told Downing Centre Local Court the allegations against Ms Nassif were “extremely serious” given Ms Nassif was in the position of a legal practitioner in the NSW Supreme Court, the large amount of money involved and it “seems to be part of a sophisticated and planned situation”.
The alleged fraud relates specifically to three of the five Skyview towers, which consist of about 960 “luxurious” apartments.
Under Nassif’s bail conditions, she is not allowed to contact 24 people linked to the alleged fraud, must live at her mother’s Chiswick home and abide by a curfew of 6am to 9pm.
Her property developer father is among the people she cannot contact, but there is no suggestion he is involved in any wrongdoing.
Ms Nassif has had to surrender her passport.
In 2019, Ashlyn’s father, Jean, Nassif went viral on social media for gifting his 34-year-old wife Nissering “Nissy”’ Nassif a $480,000 Lamborghini.
Last year, Mr Nassif had his development licence suspended for 10 years by NSW Fair Trading in December and his company Toplace permanently blacklisted after being found guilty of improper conduct.
But on January 10, he won a stay of the ban in the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal until a review of that decision takes place.
Toplace and Mr Nassif can keep operating in the meantime, but cannot take on new contracts without approval from NCAT and the Commissioner of Fair Trading, the tribunal previously heard.
Ms Nassif’s case will return to court on June 14.