Treatment by LSUC [now the LSO]
Mistreatment by certain staffers of the Law Society could be summed up as a "death by a thousand innuendoes". I have been questoned patronizingly, for example, about how many sticky notes we do or do not use in our firm files, our practices for closing out finished files, and whether I am somehow covering for my unjustly disbarred brother practising law if he so much as says hello to a neighbor of 50 years. Lately several real estate clients have been phoned gratuitously supposedly to ascertain if they dealt with me or my brother and if they have any complaints about the firm. My articling student has had his livelihood threatened. An attempt was made to invade the personal lives and information of my secretaries. Despite my giving a 23-page affidavit regarding my efforts to cooperate with the inquisitors, two different ones want to interview me under oath at different times - including one of them wanting two hours of my time over a file I never handled and know nothing about except that it exists. Naturally, they will not give me a tape recording or transcript of the interviews but have grudgingly said I am at liberty to get them transcribed at my expense. After my brother's disbarment, they ran an ad in two local community newspapers where no relevant clients lived begging people to lodge complaints after the fact, but did not even take the time to write to or phone the relevant clients to see if they had any actual complaints. Now they want names and phone numbers of most of the people for whom I made wills to question them on whether it was truly I who made the wills. Despite my forty plus years' experience with the justice system, they question my competence? Quasi clerks who would never have made it through the rigours of law school are allowed to belittle my talents and achievements. Everything they do seems geared to frighten clients away from dealing with my firm. October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month in some jurisdictions. In Ontario it ought to be LS Emotional Violence Awareness Month.
When I filled out my first draft of my formal Application for Surrender of Licence to Practise Law, under the heading REASON FOR SURRENDER, this is what I wrote: "Continual harassment of myself, my firm, my employees and my clients by LSUC personnel; e.g., ads in The Mirror re seized trust account where no relevant clients lived, yet no effort to contact said clients by mail or telephone and would not let me do so either; subpoenaing clients in delicate health; publishing my home address multiple times; prying into details of private family matters; smearing my dead Mother's reputation." This is the SHORT version.
When I filled out my first draft of my formal Application for Surrender of Licence to Practise Law, under the heading REASON FOR SURRENDER, this is what I wrote: "Continual harassment of myself, my firm, my employees and my clients by LSUC personnel; e.g., ads in The Mirror re seized trust account where no relevant clients lived, yet no effort to contact said clients by mail or telephone and would not let me do so either; subpoenaing clients in delicate health; publishing my home address multiple times; prying into details of private family matters; smearing my dead Mother's reputation." This is the SHORT version.
