The solicitor found to have acted as a “postbox” to hide conflicts of interest in the class action over Banksia Securities’ collapse has been suspended from the roll of practitioners in Victoria for two years, after a judge found he was presently unfit to practice.
The judge overseeing the scandal-ridden Banksia Securities class action has questioned why a solicitor on record for the case hasn’t handed over his ill-gotten fees despite professed regret for his actions and his claims to have reformed.
The behaviour of the legal team running the Banksia Securities class action was “reprehensible” and the solicitor who allowed himself to be controlled by lawyer and funder Mark Elliott should be struck from the court’s roll of practitioners, a judge heard Tuesday.
A solicitor fighting to remain on the roll after his involvement in the infamous Banksia Securities class action has told of his regret at having lunch with the funder behind the case eight years ago — a meeting that set in motion a plot driven by lawyers to deceive seven Supreme Court judges and defraud thousands of investors.
Commenting on the unprecedented nature of the case against her client — the so-called postbox solicitor in the Banksia Securities class action — a senior barrister has told a court of her shock at the conduct of her former colleague at the bar, Norman O’Bryan, who acted as lead counsel in the scandal-ridden litigation.
National law firm Lander & Rogers has failed in its bid to stop a client reviewing invoices totalling $2 million, even though the legal fees were paid by a litigation funder.