Touting Lawyers Caught On Camera

Source : TODAY, Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Trio suspended for offering fees to a 'property agent'

THREE lawyers have been suspended from practice after they were found guilty of touting.

In the Court of Three Judges yesterday, Chief Justice Chan Sek Keong handed lawyers Phyllis Tan Guat Neo, Lilian Bay Puay Joo and James Liew Boon Kwee immediate suspension terms of 15 months, 12 months and nine months, respectively, for touting for conveyancing work.

The trio, who were hauled to court by the Law Society of Singapore, were also ordered to pay legal costs for all the proceedings.

The three lawyers were caught secretly on camera — on separate occasions in February and March 2004 — attempting or agreeing to offer fees to a "property agent" for referring conveyancing work to their respective firms.

The "property agent" was, in fact, Ms Jenny Lee, a part-time investigator with Dong Investigation and Security Consultancy. A group of unnamed lawyers had approached the private investigation firm in February that year to obtain evidence of law firms that were offering incentives to property agents for client referrals.

All three lawyers had earlier appealed for the evidence against them to be thrown out of court on the grounds that Ms Lee had obtained the recordings by entrapment.

But the court held that a prosecution based on entrapment evidence was not an "abuse of process" if the purpose was to determine whether the accused was guilty of the offences. The court added that excluding such evidence would be "inconsistent with the terms of the Evidence Act".

This is for the second time that the Law Society has taken action against touting lawyers. In December last year, Dave Tan Buck Chye was suspended for six months for a similar offence.

The touting cases are the latest in a string of incidents involving errant lawyers.

The Law Society is in the midst of examining law firm Sadique Marican and ZM Amin's clients' account after partner Zulkifli Amin allegedly went missing with as much as $6 million last month.