Jennifer Messado

Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision

The Disciplinary Committee of the General Legal Council found Attorney Jennifer Messado guilty of professional misconduct for breaching a professional undertaking dated 17 February 2014, under which she undertook not to part with Duplicate Certificates of Title without first paying the complainant sums of J$6,484,000, J$19,000,000 and US$26,876. She permitted the titles to be mortgaged/transferred to her client Mark Jones and GAM Limited (via First Global Bank) to the complainant's detriment. Her defence that she lacked intent to breach and genuinely believed her client would raise financing was rejected, citing Beller v The Law Society. The panel found breaches of Canons I(b), IV(s), VI(d) and VI(e), with VI(d)/(e) constituting professional misconduct under Canon VIII(d). The hearing proceeded in the respondent's absence after her counsel withdrew. The panel reserved its decision on sanction to allow the respondent to address mitigation. No dishonesty was found; the conduct was characterised as negligence/recklessness.

Duties found breached:

• Overriding duty to the court
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Continuity and handover of representation
• No conflict between current clients

Aggravating factors:

• Complainant had received neither the titles nor the monies owed as of the hearing date