National Post (National Edition)
‘Completely betrayed’
B.C. MAN WHO MASQUERADED AS A LAWYER NOW SUBJECT OF COURT INJUNCTION
Last fall, Jonathan Davidson asked his father if it was okay if he brought a new friend over to dinner. A welder in his 20s, Davidson had been going through a rough time — including a custody battle with his ex-girlfriend — when he met Ronald James Mckinnon, a Vancouver man in his early 60s.
The two had met months earlier when Mckinnon hired the younger man for repairs on a condo building he managed. Mckinnon described himself as a semi-retired lawyer and became a mentor and confidant to Davidson — even took on some legal matters for him pro bono.
“No one else was helping me. … I felt safe,” Davidson recalls.
Rick Davidson allowed his son and his friend to visit his Port Coquitlam, B.C., home in November. Over dinner, Mckinnon was personable and witty, with Mark Twain quotes on “the tip of his tongue,” the senior Davidson recalls.
At one point, Mckinnon boasted that he was in the midst of the biggest case of his career.
But Rick Davidson still felt uneasy that this stranger was suddenly becoming involved in his son’s affairs. “We told Jonathan to be careful,” he says.
It turns out, there was good reason to worry.
Earlier last month, the Law Society of British Columbia announced in a press release that Mckinnon, 63, “is not and has never been a lawyer in Canada.” The statement came after the society successfully filed a petition in B.C. Supreme Court seeking to “protect the public from Mr. Mckinnon’s charlatanism.” A judge granted an injunction barring him from practising law or representing himself as a lawyer until he becomes a member in good standing.
Court filings related to the petition allege that Mckinnon had masqueraded as a lawyer to multiple individuals and provided them — or purported to provide them — various services.
The filings also note that Mckinnon has used a number of aliases, including Ronald Magoo Mckinnon, and has multiple fraud-related convictions. He was found guilty, for instance, of filing tax returns that claimed refunds or credits to which he was not entitled.
Nobody answered the door last month at the East Vancouver laneway house that is listed in court documents as Mckinnon’s home address. He did not reply to an email or respond to messages left on his cell and home phone numbers.
On one occasion a man did answer Mckinnon’s landline, identifying himself as James Kellogg, a close friend. He said Mckinnon was away “at his Los Angeles office.”
But Kellogg declined to discuss the allegations by the law society. “You can get any information from him,” he said.
When played a recording of the conversation, Jonathan Davidson said he was certain the man was, in fact, Mckinnon.
Davidson is among a handful of witnesses who provided written affidavits in support of the law society’s petition. In it, he writes that Mckinnon claimed to be “independently wealthy, having made numerous successful investments over the years.” Mckinnon also led him to believe he was “semi-retired from the practice of law,” Davidson writes.
Nonetheless, Davidson writes, Mckinnon provided him a range of legal services, mostly free of charge, including drafting a will and helping him incorporate his welding business. In addition, Mckinnon offered to help him appeal a tax assessment on a property Davidson managed on behalf of his grandmother.
When Davidson faced an assault allegation from his ex-girlfriend, Mckinnon offered to do legal research and contact various people who might be able to help. But this time, he charged a fee.
“In early March 2018, I transferred $2,000 to Mr. Mckinnon,” Davidson writes in his affidavit.
Davidson also alleges that Mckinnon offered to help him in a child-custody dispute. “He said that he prepared and filed court documents and scheduled a hearing to take place on March 19, 2018. When we went to go to the court on (that day), he said the date had been rescheduled. I later learned from the court registry that no such date had been scheduled and that no documents had been filed.”
That’s when Davidson contacted the law society and learned that Mckinnon wasn’t a lawyer. “(I felt) completely betrayed,” he says, by someone he considered to be a close friend and mentor.
Davidson has since lodged a complaint with the RCMP and filed a civil claim in provincial court that alleges Mckinnon owes him tens of thousands of dollars related to a “loan for purchase of (a) condo” and “holding money for investments.”
In a brief reply filed in court, Mckinnon said, “the calculations are not accurate.”
Rick Davidson only met Mckinnon that one time at dinner. In a written affidavit, the father says while he had no reason to doubt Mckinnon’s story, he was still a bit puzzled by Mckinnon’s friendship with his son, given the age difference.
“My son was going through a difficult time in his life which I thought made him vulnerable,” he writes.
The father even went so far as to conduct an Internet search to make sure Mckinnon was a lawyer. But there were so many Ron Mckinnons it was hard to get a definitive answer.
Others were suspicious of Mckinnon, too.
Megan Hague is a sales representative for Homelife Benchmark Realty. One day last fall, she writes in an affidavit, Mckinnon called about a property she had listed in Surrey, B.C. He identified himself as a lawyer and said that he and his client, Jonathan Davidson, wanted to view the property.
Mckinnon told her his client didn’t need a realtor because he could draft the paperwork himself.
“I thought it was odd that he offered to draft up the contract, given that typically we use standard form contracts for purchase and sale of properties,” Hague writes.
Hague writes she also found it odd that a lawyer would use a Hotmail account for emails. So she and her husband searched for Mckinnon on Google. “After finding nothing online to confirm Mr. Mckinnon’s claims to be a lawyer, we were skeptical of his credentials and his intentions,” she writes.
In another affidavit, Chris Carleton writes that Mckinnon, a friend of his father’s, had offered to help him incorporate his company. “He said he would not charge me,” Carleton writes. “As I thought he was a lawyer, I appreciated his assistance.”
When he learned recently from the law society that Mckinnon was not a lawyer, Carleton was “taken aback,” he told the Post in an email. “We invited him to our wedding and he was always very generous to us.”
But there were moments, he admits, when Mckinnon said things that seemed too good to be true. At a recent dinner gathering, he claimed he was in talks with Berkshire Hathaway, the American conglomerate led by billionaire Warren Buffett, to become the CEO and chairman of a new Canadian arm of the company, Carleton said.
“He offered (Jonathan Davidson) and myself employment in relation to the new venture. My wife and I were skeptical given the grandiosity of the claim, but trusted Ron at the time and decided to wait for more information.”
No one at the company returned calls to confirm Mckinnon’s claims.
The recent petition was not the first time the law society has taken action against Mckinnon. Records show that in 2016, the society learned that Mckinnon had represented himself as co-counsel for a defendant in a motor vehicle claim. Mckinnon contacted the plaintiff ’s lawyer seeking to reschedule the date for an examination for discovery.
The law society attempted to compel Mckinnon to sign an undertaking that he not represent himself as a lawyer. But Mckinnon wouldn’t sign it and denied any wrongdoing.
The society lacked sufficient evidence to take further action, but warned Mckinnon that if it received information he was holding himself out to be a lawyer again, it would move forward with court proceedings, a spokeswoman said this month.
She added that if Mckinnon persists in practising law in spite of the recent court order, “we may initiate contempt proceedings against him.”
WE INVITED HIM TO OUR WEDDING AND HE WAS ALWAYS VERY GENEROUS TO US.