One ‘lawyer’, two names and millions missing
SPLIT PERSONALITY: Patel Muhamed, or Mohamed Patel? IS he Mohamed Ismail Patel, or Patel Muhamed? Is he 67, or 72? Does he have a law degree, or a worthless piece of paper?
These are questions swirling around a Cape Town attorney facing a series of lawsuits and a bid by the Cape Law Society to have him struck off the roll.
Even he doesn’t seem to know who he is. Writing to Cape Law Society last December, his law firm’s letterhead named him as Mohamed Patel, but his signature read P Muhamed.
He is accused of contriving his qualifications by assuming the identity of lawyer Patel Muhamed, who died in 2006, and of duping the high court into admitting him as an attorney in 2011.
He was interdicted from practising as a lawyer in February and faces a series of lawsuits.
Law society director Frank Dorey said: “The society contends, on the strength of an affidavit by the registrar of the University of the Western Cape, that Mr Muhamed was not honest when he stated in his application for admission as an attorney that he had been awarded a B Proc degree by the university in 1994.”
He said the society contended that Muhamed misappropriated money from his trust account and from an insolvent estate.
The high court ordered his removal as a trustee of the insolvent estate and told him to hand all documents and bank statements to Absa. The bank wanted him removed because he allegedly withheld its funds.
Leonard Katz, the director of law firm ENSafrica, acting for Absa, said he reported the man to the law society and the master of the high court when he discovered that he had two identity numbers and two names.
At the time, the man was a joint liquidator of Kingsfield Aviation Leasing One, which was accused of running a R200million scam that fleeced prominent businesspeople, including Shoprite chairman Christo Wiese, Remgro director Jannie Durand and property developer Paul Berman.
Katz told the court that a background check revealed that “Muhamed Ismail Patel” was born on August 29 1944 while “Patel Muhamed” was born on April 26 1949.
“There is no record of Patel ever having obtained a law degree,” Katz told the Sunday Times. “Patel has stolen millions from innocent creditors.”
In an affidavit attached to court documents, UWC registrar Nita Lawton-Misra said there was no record of either “Mr Patel” or “Mr Muhamed” having registered at the institution.
The Sunday Times was unable to trace the man, who describes himself as the “national general secretary of the Association for the Advancement of Black Insolvency Practitioners in South Africa”.
But in a letter to law society attorneys last December he dismissed allegations against himself as “spurious and false”, vowing to clear his name.
“I confirm that I have satisfied both law society and the high court to be admitted as an attorney,” he wrote.
“I am of the view that your threats to apply for rescission of the order of my admission as an attorney are premature, unfounded and malicious.”
The law society’s application has yet to be heard.
There is no record of Patel ever having obtained a law degree