How much money does one person need?  When you have a job paying you more than $100K per year, do you really need to steal more?  Scott Murray obviously thought so.

Murray, the former chief executive of Sonray Capital Markets, has spent almost three months behind bars.  He will spend at least another 700 there as well.

The 33-year-old former finance executive, who admitted shuffling millions of dollars of Sonray clients' funds from one account to another and then peeled some off to meet his own expenses, has been ordered to spend up to five years in jail with a minimum term of two years and six months.

Murray was given a hefty discount on his sentence due to his decision to plead guilty and co-operate with the corporate regulator warranted a hefty discount on what otherwise would have been a 10-year jail term.

Scheming for Stolen Funds

Sonray collapsed in June 2010 due to  ''a massive loss'' of $46.7 million.  Murray and his boss, Russell Johnson, had unfettered access to Sonray's accounting system, enabling them to dip into clients' accounts without authority and transfer funds between them.

Johnson was charged in late September with 24 counts including multiple counts of theft, conspiracy to commit theft and conspiracy to commit false accounting.

Clients who suffered big losses in Sonray's collapse include Melbourne-based property developer Will Deague and Murray's former Melbourne Grammar schoolmate, Carey Anderson.

Murray lodged fake amounts as ''deposits'' in Mr. Anderson's accounts but, because no actual cash went in, Mr. Anderson's accounts ended up more than $23 million in deficit by February 2009.

Murray pleaded guilty earlier this year to 10 charges, including theft, obtaining financial advantage by deception in relation to commissions Saxo Bank had paid to Sonray, and misleading an auditor who was asked to examine Sonray's accounts.

Six of the charges focused on false accounting involving sham entries for deposits valued at  $9.78 million and others for fake withdrawals totaling $7.8 million.

According to Murray, Johnson in April 2008 told him to ''drag money out of a friendly account'' - namely, clients' accounts - and use it to plug a widening gap in Sonray's operating budget.