LAW SOCIETY RUNAROUND
When you are facing a significant problem, chances are you seek the services of a lawyer. But what happens when you have a problem with a lawyer? Who ya gonna call? Bar-busters?
B.C. entrepreneur Wesley Richards has a beef with Ontario lawyer Colin Pendrith over allegedly threatening and belligerent conduct during November 2016 B.C. proceedings in acrimonious litigation with Dairy Queen Canada Inc. now before the Supreme Court of Canada.
He said he called the Law Society of B.C. (LSBC) and was told to file his complaint with the authority where Pendrith was licensed — the Law Society of Upper Canada, the profession’s self-regulatory agency in that province.
Acting on that advice, on Feb. 21, Richards filed his complaint.
On March 5, David Cass, the Ontario society’s Intake and Resolution Counsel, replied, explaining that Richards was misinformed.
In 2013, the members of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada reached a National Mobility Agreement that said lawyers from one province are entitled to practise in other provinces.
That agreement stated: “When providing legal services in a host jurisdiction with respect to the law of a host jurisdiction, all lawyers will be required to comply with the applicable legislation, regulations, rules and standards of professional conduct of the host jurisdiction.”
Cass emphasized: “Lawyers practising law in B.C. are subject to the rules and regulations established by the LSBC, regardless of where they are licensed.”
He insisted that “while practicing law in British Columbia, Mr. Pendrith is subject to the Code of Professional Conduct of the LSBC and any complaints about his conduct while doing so must be made to the LSBC and not the (Law Society of Upper Canada).”
The Ontario official said that he reviewed all Richards’ materials and supporting documents before concluding no further investigation was necessary.
Richards went back to the B.C. Law Society.
This time, on March 13, Lynne Knights, the society’s “intake officer, professional conduct,” reiterated in a letter what he had been previously told on the phone: “We are the governing body for B.C. lawyers only.”
“If you have a complaint about a Canadian lawyer outside of B.C., you will have to contact the Law Society which governs lawyers for the province in which the lawyer in question practices,” Knights maintained.
She enclosed a brochure describing the society’s complaints process — Concerned About The Conduct of a Lawyer?
He was, but the 57-year-old accountant was also confused.
Richards went back to the Ontario society for clarification and Cass reiterated on March 14 that the Ontario watchdog had no jurisdiction over conduct in B.C.
“The file was closed because of, to use your expression, ‘purely jurisdictional issues,’” he wrote.
Richards felt like pulling his hair out.
This kind of runaround is unfair to the public and professionals involved.
“The allegations are simply untrue,” Pendrith, of Cassels Brock in Toronto, told me. “Mr. Richards only made these false allegations, for the first time, when he brought his appeal after the summary trial decision was released in March 2017. That decision granted judgment to our client and dismissed the counterclaim of Mr. Richards and the other defendants.”
Without judging the merit of his complaint, Richards’ credibility in the litigation was shredded by trial and appellate judges.
A unanimous division of the province’s top bench ruled against him and said his assertions in that court were inconsistent with his sworn testimony, a substantial documentary record and “not reasonably capable of belief.”
“As the respondent put it, this is more than simply new evidence, this is a reversal of the entire case that Mr. Richards took to trial,” Justice John Hunter said.
He lost everything — living for a while in a trailer with his wife, 82-year-old mother-in-law, and 15-year-old son — and was obviously angry. However, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Sharon Matthews last month ruled one of his recent moves in the litigation was an abuse of process:
“In my view, although the financialdevastationtoMr.Richards and his family is profound, they have not been deprived of fairness in the proceedings before this Court or the Court of Appeal. Fairness does not dictate the outcome Mr. Richards seeks. Fairness dictates an end to this litigation.”
The Supreme Court of Canada will do that, but shouldn’t his conduct complaint have been handled better — even if it meant him being told he was dead wrong and vexatious?
When contacted by Postmedia, the Law Society of B.C. acknowledged it is responsible for complaints about out-of-province lawyers covered by the mobility agreement.
Asked about Richards’ complaint, the society spokesman said in an email: “In this instance, we received an inquiry about how to make a complaint about an Ontario lawyer, without mentioning that the issue may have been in relation to services here in B.C. Based on the limited information we were provided, we connected the person to what we understood they needed in order to make their complaint.”
Richards scoffed, saying he sent all the information in a March letter that reads: “I originally filed my complaint with the Law Society of Upper Canada, which responded ... that it does not have the jurisdiction to investigate this issue because the actions took place in B.C.”
Who ya gonna call?