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Author Topic: Geoffrey Heng Guan Hong [Certified Dishonest]  (Read 5001 times)

Offline greentara

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Geoffrey Heng Guan Hong [Certified Dishonest]
« on: January 01, 2016, 09:24:03 PM »
December 1997
• Lawyer Geoffrey Heng Guan Hong, known for his ability to pull in lucrative property deals for his firm, faced six charges of committing misconduct “unbefitting” of a lawyer by cheating clients in two property transactions.
• He went missing with $3.2 million.

Source: https://www.mlaw.gov.sg/content/dam/minlaw/corp/assets/documents/linkclick7efa.pdf

Offline greentara

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Re: Geoffrey Heng Guan Hong [Certified Dishonest]
« Reply #1 on: January 01, 2016, 09:26:33 PM »
If I see my errant partner again, I'll say: It's pay-back time

BANKRUPT lawyer Thomas Loh isn't the only lawyer who's had to pay for his partner's sins.

Lawyers Derrick Wong and R Ravindran fell victim too when one of their partners, who was deeply in debt, took money from the firm's clients' account and fled the country in December 1997.

Mr Wong, who has been in practice for over 20 years, was a senior partner in Derrick, Ravi & Partners when Geoffrey Heng Guan Hong ran off with some $3 million.

Mr Wong, Mr Ravindran and their other partner, Mr N Sreenivasan, had to make good the losses.

It is estimated that they may have had to fork out nearly $1 million each, though none of them wanted to reveal the exact amount.

Heng, who is still a wanted man, has not been heard of since.

The Supreme Court has struck him off as a lawyer for 'gross misconduct' and acting in a scandalous manner.

MORAL DEBT

Mr Wong said: 'What can I do now, if I meet him along the streets? I'd probably say: 'You owe me a lot. It's pay-back time.'

'I will say that to make sure he knows he's in debt to us - not only for the money, but also morally.'

Heng, a former SAF scholar, was a high-flying lawyer who was known for his ability to pull in lucrative property deals for the firm.

He ended up cheating some of his clients. He also borrowed money from other lawyers and some clients, telling them various sob stories to pay his gambling debts. He had also duped one of his partners into releasing some of the firm's money to him.

Mr Ravindran told The New Paper: 'It was a nightmare that we want to put behind us, to get on with our lives.

'We had to manage the crisis for three to four months, until we knew what was at the bottom of the pit, or whether we've reached it.'

The professional indemnity insurance for lawyers does not cover cases of fraud.

But Mr Wong, who now runs his own firm, said he and the other two senior partners in the firm felt 'it was honourable for them to bear the cost'.

Mr Ravindran said: 'It was a nightmare. I couldn't sleep for a few nights. We had to pay up from our own pockets.

STUCK TOGETHER
'It had an impact on our families and our friends.'

But they stuck together through the crisis.

It was only a few years later that they each went their separate ways, for their own reasons.

Source: http://shaproperty.blogspot.sg/2006/06/realedge-tnp-rogue-lawyers-ruined.html