Jail for corrupt Ipswich council figures

Former Ipswich City Council chief executive Carl Wulff will spend the next 18 months in jail for receiving about $240,000 in corrupt payments.

His wife Sharon Oxenbridge, businessman Wayne Myers and contractor Claude Walker have also been jailed for their involvement in kickback schemes.

They are the first to be jailed from a wide-ranging Crime and Corruption Commission investigation into Ipswich council, which sparked 86 criminal charges against 15 people.

Wulff accepted envelopes stuffed with cash, gifts and other corrupt payments made via a complex arrangement involving his three co-offenders.

Through the 66-year-old and Oxenbridge's bogus consultancy company Bojangles Pty Ltd, the couple accepted payments to treat Myers and Walker favourably regarding council contracts.

After his company received a lucrative flood recovery contract in 2012, Walker paid Wulff $104,000 over two years.

"Walker made the payments believing that they would allow him to continue to work for the council on favourable conditions," Chief Judge Kerry O'Brien said in sentencing in the Brisbane District Court on Friday.

Similarly, Wulff received about $130,000 from Myers for his friend Wayne Francis Innes to continue receiving council contracts in 2013-14.

"Over a period of five months, Innes paid you, Myers over $523,000. The money ultimately paid to Wulff was disseminated from those payments," Chief Judge O'Brien said.

A deck was built at Wulff and Oxenbridge's home through the corrupt arrangements.

For "greasing the wheels", Myers would receive 30 per cent of Innes' profits from council work.

To further disguise invoices, Oxenbridge employed herself as a consultant "fully aware you would not be providing any consultancy work," the judge said.

She allowed her husband of 18 years to use her email to falsely invoice the corrupt payments.

Wulff pleaded guilty to two counts of official corruption and one count of attempting to pervert the course of justice after lying to authorities and encouraging his co-offenders to do the same.

He was handed a four-and-a-half-year jail sentence, suspended after 20 months.

Having been in custody since December, he will be eligible for release in August next year.

Myers, Oxenbridge and Walker all pleaded guilty to one charge of official corruption.

Oxenbridge, 51, and Walker, 61, were handed three-year sentences, suspended after nine months.

The 64-year-old Myers' two-and-a-half-year sentence will be suspended after six months.

"The conduct in which the four of you engaged is conduct which can only serve to undermine public confidence in local government," Chief Justice O'Brien said.

"The corruption secured favourable treatment - treatment not available to those who were prepared to operate legitimately and transparency.

"You must be punished for what you did.

"General deterrence and the need for public denunciation for such conduct, in my assessment, is an important consideration in this case."