Fraud by another name

By A.S. Silva

(July 29, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The proud father announced to all his friends and relatives that his lawyer son was getting married and that the son was joining him in his legal practice which he had successfully carried on for a number of years.

On his son’s first day at the law firm, the father assigned him to a case that he had been involved in. This particular case had been going through the law courts at Hulftsdorp for quite a number of years.

The son took over the case and within a couple of weeks came back to the father and proudly announced that he had managed to conclude the case.

On hearing this, the father became livid and started shouting at his son — "You took over the case which I had been involved in for so many years and within two weeks concluded it! Do you know that, that case paid for your education and other expenditure?"

It is sad indeed but the story of the father and son is played out year after year in Sri Lanka in various unscrupulous ways resulting in the poor litigant/respondent paying through his nose. In some cases, the litigant/respondent gives up though sheer exhaustion and depletion of resources.

Fraud in the broadest sense is an intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual. Fraud is a crime, and is also a civil law violation. Defrauding people of money is presumably the most common type of fraud and this type of practice of delaying case hearings intentionally is unpardonable especially when it is being perpetrated by the very individuals who people rely on to uphold their legal rights in the law courts.

It is indeed sad to say that the legal fraternity in this country has stooped to very low levels to earn their keep and whilst it is wrong to apply the broad brush and paint all lawyers and judiciary in this way, the man on the street has no reason to believe that the lawyer he consults has his best interest at heart.

The doctors ascribe to the Hippocratic Oath and I presume the legal fraternity also swear on similar lines — it is indeed a farcical thing they do because their conduct (or should one say misconduct) in court is otherwise.

It is a plea, a very small plea to the honorable gentlemen and ladies to whom this letter is addressed — the Chief Justice, the Attorney General, the judicial and legal fraternity — to do something about it because at the end of the day we all have to face up to our own doings and conscience.

"Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts" — Aristotle.

-Sri Lanka Guardian