The Legal Services Board has moved to a new office. Our contact details have changed. Our new contact details are:
Address:
Level 5, 555 Bourke Street Melbourne 3000
GPO Box 492 Melbourne 3001
Ausdoc: DX 185 Melbourne
Telephone:
Reception: 03 9679 8001
Practitioner Services: 03 9679 8000
LSB Online: 03 9679 8111
Fax: 03 9679 8101
Email: admin@lsbc.vic.gov.au
Web: www.lsbc.vic.gov.au
RPA News #14, September 2014, is available for download (314KB PDF). This news update covers the the appointment of the inaugural Commissioner for Uniform Legal Services Regulation and Chief Executive of the Legal Services Council, Dale Boucher.
The practising certificate renewals cycle for 2014-2015 will commence on Monday, 24 March 2014. The deadline for renewing your practising certificate without incurring a surcharge is 30 April 2014.
You will receive a letter from the Legal Services Board in the week beginning 24 March 2014 which will outline details of the renewals process. You can renew your practising certificate online again through the Board’s online application LSB Online. You can login to LSB Online using your Practitioner Number as the username. Your Practitioner Number will be published in the letter sent to you by the Board. The hard copy renewal form will be available on the Board’s website from Monday 24 March if you do not wish to renew online.
Please contact the Board on 9679 8000 for more information.
A debt collector who attempted to mislead a member of the public into believing she was a lawyer has been found guilty of engaging in unqualified legal practice.
Ms Tracey Burnell of Landlord Protection & Collection appeared before the Ringwood Magistrates’ Court charged with representing an entitlement to engage in legal practice when she was not entitled to do so.
The Legal Services Board had brought the charge against Ms Burnell after an investigation revealed that while seeking to recover an alleged debt on behalf of a client, she had used a false name in a telephone conversation and claimed to be a solicitor. The investigation also revealed that on a second occasion Ms Burnell had written a letter purporting to be from the legal department of her company, implying she was entitled to engage in legal practice. Ms Burnell does not hold any legal qualifications.
The court rejected Ms Burnell’s plea in mitigation that she had mistakenly believed her company’s previous retention of solicitors to intervene in disputes meant that she was entitled say that her company had a legal department.
Ms Burnell pleaded guilty to the charge. The Court recorded a conviction, fined her $7,500 and ordered her to pay the Board’s costs of $7,133.
The latest edition of the Grants Program newsletter, (Vol 11) is available for download from the Previously Funded Projects page.
RPA News #15, December 2014, is available for download (334KB PDF). This news update announces the public consultation phase of the draft Uniform Legal Profession Rules.
The offices of the Legal Services Board and Commissioner will be closed from 2:00 pm on Wednesday 24 December 2014 and will re-open at 9:00 am on Monday 5 January 2014.
RPA Alert #11, May 2014, is available for download (452KB PDF). This Alert announces the consultation period for the proposed Victorian Solicitors’ Conduct Rules.
A country solicitor will never again practise law in Australia after the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal found he was not a fit and proper person to hold a practising certificate.
Victorian lawyer, Mr John Moir, who ran the Albury-based sole practice WJ Kell Lawyers until 2012, was found guilty of four charges of professional misconduct which were brought against him by the Legal Services Commissioner.
VCAT heard that Mr Moir had borrowed $200,000 from longstanding clients, with a promise to invest the money and to deliver a tenfold return within two months. Mr Moir did not invest the money as the clients had agreed, instead he used part of it to pay off debts associated with his practice.
When the clients sought their promised repayments, Mr Moir made a series of excuses for why the investment had not yet been made and so repayments were not forthcoming. Mr Moir later wrote to his clients and gave them an undertaking to repay the money, with a small interest payment, by a set date. Mr Moir failed to deliver on this undertaking and the clients sued him in the Albury District Court to recover the debt. Mr Moir was then declared bankrupt and the Legal Services Board appointed a manager to wind up his practice.
Mr Moir pleaded guilty to the charges of accepting a loan from his clients, failing to avoid a conflict of interest, breaching an undertaking and failing to provide relevant information to the Commissioner.
Mr Moir gave VCAT an undertaking to never again apply for a practising certificate within Australia. VCAT accepted the undertaking, noting in its decision:
‘Mr Moir’s fate demonstrates graphically the consequences which can follow where a solicitor succumbs to the temptation to borrow money from clients. The rule is simple and clear, solicitors must not borrow money from their clients. To do so places them in a hopelessly conflicted position.’
VCAT ordered Mr Moir pay the Commissioner’s costs of $6,938.
For further information, see the VCAT Decision.
Lawyers are reminded that they are prohibited from borrowing money from clients following a recent disciplinary prosecution in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
Sole practitioner Mr Philip Adami was charged by the Legal Services Commissioner with professional misconduct after he borrowed $30,000 from a longstanding client. A routine trust account inspection identified the apparent loan, triggering an investigation by the Commissioner.
Mr Adami, who had an unblemished 54-year history of legal practice, pleaded guilty to the charge.
While noting that Mr Adami’s actions were expressly prohibited by the Legal Profession Rules, Senior Member Butcher of VCAT said:
‘… borrowing from a client raises the spectre of a conflict of interest especially in the circumstances such as these where no security was given for the loan’.
‘It is at the core of professional practice that one must scrupulously avoid situations of conflict of interest between the interests of clients and one’s personal interests …’.
VCAT heard that Mr Adami had taken steps to alter his practising environment, having brought in a new partner to become the principal of the practice and to operate the practice’s trust account. Mr Adami therefore now has nothing to do with the practice’s trust account.
A joint submission on penalty between the Commissioner and Mr Adami was considered and accepted by VCAT.
Mr Adami was suspended from practice for two months, ordered not to apply for a practicing certificate with trust authorisation prior to 1 July 2018, and to pay the Commissioner’s costs of $5,000.
For further information, see the VCAT decision.
A lawyer who had been found guilty of misconduct on multiple occasions over a period of seven years has been struck off by the Supreme Court of Victoria.
Supreme Court Justice Ferguson ordered that the name of former Gippsland solicitor Mr Nicholas Telehus be removed from the roll of legal practitioners after the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal earlier found he was not a fit and proper person to work as a lawyer.
VCAT had found Mr Telehus guilty of 27 professional misconduct charges which had been brought against him by the Legal Services Commissioner; the fifth such time Mr Telehus had been prosecuted for misconduct since 2007.
The Commissioner charged Mr Telehus with a string of offences including misappropriation of client money, providing false statutory declarations, failing to lodge income tax and GST returns and failing to comply with an order of the Magistrates’ Court.
Acting Legal Services Commissioner, Russell Daily, said the strike off would protect consumers from a dishonest person.
‘Mr Telehus committed acts that were fundamentally at odds with his responsibilities as a lawyer’, Mr Daily said.
‘Lawyers who steal from their clients will be brought to account.’
Mr Telehus commenced practising law in 2003. His practising certificate was cancelled in 2008 by VCAT order. Mr Telehus applied to renew his practising certificate in 2009 and 2011 but his application was refused on both occasions over concerns about his conduct.
In January 2014 VCAT found Mr Telehus guilty of 27 charges of professional misconduct and recommended that his name be removed from the role of legal practitioners maintained by the Supreme Court. For further information, see the VCAT Decision and Reasons (1.09MB PDF).
A lawyer who falsified his academic transcript in order to obtain a job has pleaded guilty to six charges of professional misconduct in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
The lawyer, granted the pseudonym of PFM by VCAT due to considerations for his current mental health, was brought to the attention of the Legal Services Commissioner through a complaint made by his former employer. Following a lengthy investigation, the Commissioner brought six charges of professional misconduct against PFM relating to supplying recruitment agencies with forged academic transcripts, providing false information on a CV, making false representations about his employment status and making a false statutory declaration to the Law Institute of Victoria.
During the Tribunal hearing, Senior Member Smithers of VCAT noted that PFM had provided false and misleading information to the investigators, causing the investigation to be significantly drawn out. He also described the conduct about which PFM was charged as comprising ‘systematic dishonesty, rather than a momentary or aberrant lapse’.
In his defence, PFM presented psychiatric reports as evidence that he was suffering from a major depressive disorder, and that this had affected him in his wrongdoing. Assessing the evidence, Senior Member Smithers found that there was no causal link between PFM’s illness and his lack of candour to VCAT. Further, he found PFM was ‘not a fit and proper person, and that it is likely he is unfit to practise permanently, or at least, for the indefinite future, because he is not a person of honesty’.
VCAT found “…in order for penalty to be mitigated due to mental illness, there must be cogent and compelling evidence of the requisite relationship between the mental condition and the offending conduct. Here, the evidence falls well short of that.” On the evidence presented, the Tribunal found that “PFM’s mental health status did not have any effect relevant to the determination of penalty…” of five of the charges, and only marginally at best about the sixth.
He was ordered by the Tribunal not to be employed by or consult for a law firm without the approval of the Legal Services Board, that he may not be granted a practising certificate before 27 May 2020, and was ordered to pay the Commissioner’s costs fixed at $25,000. The VCAT decision is available on the AustLII website.
VCAT also referred PFM to the Supreme Court for his name to be struck from the roll of practitioners, and in July 2014 His Honour Judge Elliott ordered the removal of PFM’s name.
In his reasons, Justice Elliott said:
‘It is abundantly clear that, by reason of the nature and severity of the charges proved, the length of time over which the offending conduct occurred, the lack of genuine remorse (at least, for an extended period of time) and the current mental state of PFM, it is appropriate that his name be removed from the roll of practitioners.’
The issue of PFM’s pseudonym returned to the Supreme Court in August 2014 where His Honour Judge Elliott ordered that the pseudonym would continue to remain in effect until 27 May 2016.
Former Dandenong North lawyer, Mr Luke Grosser, has been banned from holding a practising certificate until 31 December 2021 after the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal found that he acted dishonestly.
VCAT found Mr Grosser, who had surrendered his practicing certificate in early 2011, had made a series of dishonest representations in an attempt to further his professional career.
The Legal Services Commissioner charged Mr Grosser with offences relating to false statements he made over his academic records, his academic qualifications, his employment experience, faked references from previous employers, statements made to the NSW Legal Profession Admission Board, and statements made to Centrelink.
The Commissioner also charged Mr Grosser with failing to provide information when it was requested of him.
Mr Grosser indicated that he would plead guilty to the Commissioner’s charges, however he did not appear at the hearing which proceeded in his absence.
Senior Member Smithers of VCAT found:
‘… Mr Grosser’s frequent, systematic and elaborate false statements over the two year period show he is not a person of honesty. There is no material on which I can conclude anything other than that he is unfit to practise permanently, or at least indefinitely.’
Mr Grosser was ordered not to hold a practising certificate until 31 December 2021 and was banned from working as a lay associate in a legal practice without the approval of the Legal Services Board. Mr Grosser was also fined a total of $6,000 and ordered to pay the Commissioner’s costs of $10,021.
VCAT recommended that Mr Grosser be referred to the Supreme Court to be removed from the local roll of practitioners.
For further information, download the VCAT decision.
A solicitor who practised law without holding a practising certificate has been found guilty of unqualified legal practice.
In October 2014 the Magistrates’ Court found Ringwood sole practitioner, Mr Graeme Steart, guilty of one count of engaging in unqualified legal practice. The Legal Services Board brought the charge after it identified Mr Steart had been undertaking legal work without holding a current practising certificate.
In 2010 Mr Steart’s application to renew his practising certificate was refused after he failed to provide evidence that he held the required professional indemnity insurance coverage. Mr Steart was advised in late 2010 and again in late 2011 that without a current practising certificate, he was not entitled to practice law.
The Court heard that Mr Steart had been engaging in legal practice between May and December 2013. Mr Steart pleaded guilty and was fined $8,000 without conviction, and ordered to pay the Board’s costs of $3,500.
The PEXA e-conveyancing system is commencing its phased roll-out. This will first occur with practitioners who were Subscribers signed up with Caveat functionality in the regional hubs of Bendigo and Geelong. Within the PEXA system there will be three ways of providing source funding to effect an e-conveyancing transaction (inclusive of financial settlement): Subscriber financial institutions, a solicitor’s trust account or a PEXA source account.
For more information please see the Information Notice published by the Board on 30 January (101KB PDF).
RPA News #16: February 2015 is available for download (474KB PDF). This edition discusses the Property Exchange Australia (PEXA) e-conveyancing system rollout to Victoria.