Advocate disbarred after hiding convictions

AN ADVOCATE has been disbarred after trying to conceal his criminal past.

Former traffic policeman Sipho Mziako‚ from Pretoria‚ abandoned his application for admission as an advocate in the KwaZulu-Natal High Court about seven years ago when the society of advocates in the province asked him uncomfortable questions. They asked for a full disclosure about his conviction for fraud‚ theft and corruption and serving an 18year prison sentence in 1995.

They also wanted him to provide a copy of the entire record of his criminal trial and any subsequent appeals; a record of all the Department of Correctional Services’ recommendations concerning his sentence; copies of their reports and recommendations by his parole officers and superiors that led to his release from prison.

He abandoned the application but made another in the high court in Pretoria in 2010. Eventually‚ he succeeded in an application to be admitted by the high court in Kimberley in 2013, when he provided a local address. Mziako studied law in prison and obtained his law degree in 2008.

He stated‚ among other things‚ that: “I am a law-abiding citizen and have no criminal record or pending criminal case against me. I submit that I am a fit and proper person to be admitted as an advocate and I am unaware of any fact that may adversely affect my status of being a fit and proper person.”

But the high court in Kimberley has now ruled that he lied about his criminal record. He also failed to reveal that Absa Bank had obtained a judgment against him in 2007 and that his property in the Rustenburg District had been attached.

Judge President Pule Tlaletsi‚ with acting deputy judge president Cecile Williams concurring‚ struck Mziako off the roll of advocates.

“The least he could have done to show that he is reformed would have been to disclose his previous convictions to the courts and not engage in a well calculated forum shopping until he was admitted by this court,” Tlaletsi said.

“His applications to Gauteng‚ KwaZulu-Natal and this court also raise doubt as to whether he indeed resided in these places within such a short period.”

Mziako could not be reached for comment by the time of going to print. — DDC