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Civility Lapses Draw Revocation

By Michael Frisch

The Ontario Law Society Tribunal Hearing Division has revoked an attorney’s license

We previously found that the two of the three allegations set out in the notice of application were proven: Law Society of Ontario v. Robson, 2023 ONLSTH 114. Specifically, we found that the Lawyer engaged in professional misconduct by failing to treat an opposing party and her counsel with courtesy, civility and good faith. He also failed to discharge all of his responsibilities to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice honourably and with integrity and failed to encourage public respect for the administration of justice.

We did not find professional misconduct regarding the allegation that he discriminated against opposing counsel.
 
For the reasons that follow, we order that the Lawyer’s licence be revoked and order that he pay costs of $94,991.85.
 
Priors
 
  The Lawyer’s lengthy disciplinary history, occurring over 15 years, shows an unwillingness, or inability, to fulfill his obligations to the Law Society during its investigations, and serial and persistent incivility towards the Law Society, the judiciary, other licensees and the public.
 
The Lawyer has been subjected to increased discipline, starting with a one-month suspension, up to most recently, a six-month suspension. It should also be noted that three of the five suspensions also included indefinite suspensions pending compliance with the Law Society’s various investigative requests.
 
In a typical case involving progressive discipline, the misconduct found in the current case is usually subsequent to penalties in the prior cases. In this case, the subject misconduct was committed after some prior penalties and before other penalties. Nevertheless, we conclude that prior penalties did not deter the misconduct in this case nor other subsequent misconduct. There is a concerning entrenched and lengthy pattern of misconduct.
 
From the misconduct findings
 
Between February 2015 to February 2018, and October 2018 to April 2019, the Respondent failed to treat an opposing party, Sara Fatahi-Ghandehari (“SF”), and her counsel, Shahzad Siddiqui (“SS”), with courtesy, civility, and good faith. He used an ongoing pattern of communications that were abusive, offensive or otherwise inconsistent with the proper tone of professional communication from a lawyer, including ill-considered criticisms of other members of the profession, contrary to Rules 7.2-1 and 7.2-4 of the Rules of Professional Conduct…

The allegations of professional misconduct have at their genesis – in one way, or another – various disputes between Stewart Wilson and Sara Fatahi-Ghandehari (collectively the WFG matters). The disputes between Mr. Wilson  and Ms. Fatahi-Ghandehari were contentious and unpleasant, frequently veering into the realm of mean-spirited and nasty.

Simply to illustrate the extent of the ongoing dispute between SW and SFG, we note that there are approximately two dozen decisions between them that are currently reported on CanLII. The most recent decision reported on CanLII is Fatahi-Ghandehari v. Wilson, 2023 ONSC 2125. For the purpose of this conduct application, we can not and need not assess the merits of this longstanding contentious litigation. It is the context in which the alleged misconduct occurred.
 
(Mike Frisch)

Posted in:
Bar Discipline & Process