Germani Jewellers’ store at Sydney’s Hilton Hotel was robbed by two men one night in January 2023.

The store’s proprietor, Michel Germani, aged 67, was in debt for more than $184,000 in rent to a hotel and devised a strategy to retrieve funds before the store was forced to close, the prosecutor, Cate Dodds, explained to a jury at the NSW District Court.

Mounir Helou, 59, and Andrea David Cusumano, 59, are jointly on trial accused of being in on the scheme.

Helou is accused of being one of the two men who robbed the store, tying up Germani and shop assistant Lana Al-Khoury.

She had not been rostered on the night of the robbery but had been called in to work by her boss.

Today, Dodds urged the jury to reject claims by lawyers for the three men on trial that Al-Khoury also knew the robbery was fake.

Germani told Helou and the second man, who cannot be legally named, to tie her up to fool police and his insurance company.

“Michel Germani needed a real victim so it would look like a real and legitimate robbery,” she said.

Al-Khoury’s terror and distress had been witnessed by security guards and police who attended the store after the robbery, the jury was told.

Claims the shop assistant had lied about the emotional effects of the incident to get worker’s compensation should also be rejected, Dodds said.

Al-Khoury, testifying in court, expressed her anxiety about potentially losing her job after observing that jewelry was being transferred from the Hilton store to Germani’s other nearby shop, which the jury was told had a genuine tone about it.

Someone planning to feign psychological symptoms and “pull the wool” over doctors and insurers for compensation would not have been worried about losing their job, Dodds said.

The eventual insurance claim seeking to recoup $2,821,348 for 164 items of jewellery “stolen” was denied, the court was told previously.

Germani has pleaded not guilty to one count of aggravated robbery and one count of detaining without consent – both of which relate to what happened to Al-Khoury on the night.

He has admitted staging the robbery to gain financially through the attempted insurance claim and to providing false statements to police.

Helou has also admitted staging the robbery but has denied a more serious charge of aggravated robbery against Al-Khoury.

Both Germani and Helou are accused of committing “corporal violence” on the shop attendant.

Cusumano has pleaded not guilty to one count of committing the staged robbery to obtain a financial advantage.