The former manager of pop star Guy Sebastian allegedly kept $900,000 of royalties and income from musical performances and an ambassadorship, with the singer discovering the accounting anomalies after their professional relationship came to a hostile end, a Sydney court has heard.
Titus Emanuel Day, 49, has pleaded not guilty in the NSW District Court to 50 counts of fraudulently embezzling royalty payments, performance fees and ambassadorship fees, received by virtue of his employment as Sebastian’s manager, and 50 alternative charges of larceny, or stealing.
Guy Sebastian and Titus Day.Credit:Wolter Peeters/Oscar Colman
The Crown alleges between 2013 and 2020, Day received payments on behalf of the singer and “rather than transferring the money … after deducting commission payable”, he “kept the funds” he should have remitted and dispersed them for purposes other than Sebastian’s benefit.
In his opening address on Tuesday, Crown prosecutor David Morters, SC, said this allegedly occurred on 50 occasions, regarding a total of approximately $900,000.
This total allegedly includes individual performance fees of up to $187,524, and one instance of $21,095 in ambassadorship fees.
Sebastian, 40, won Australian Idol in 2003 and became a successful performing and recording artist, the prosecutor said.
Day, a lawyer who has worked in the entertainment industry since the early 1990s, managed Sebastian’s professional career from 2007 to November 2017 after meeting the singer through his wife, who worked at Sony Music.
Day began managing Sebastian through the agency 22 Management, but, in about July 2009, approached him about joining his new management agency 6 Degrees. As director, Day negotiated contracts for performances, and collected royalties for the use of recordings and payment for activities.
“Mr Sebastian did not sign any written contract setting out the rights and obligations of the parties as he had done with previous management companies,” Morters said.
