Manjit Singh s/o Kirpal Singh

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

The Court of Three Judges found due cause for disciplinary action against two partners of Manjit Govind & Partners who advised their client, Ms Rankine, to transfer $1.8m to their wives ostensibly for safekeeping and future legal fees, then refused to return it, falsely claiming it was a gift. The 1st Respondent also misused a $20,000 cashier's order for an unrelated matter. The Court rejected allegations of tribunal bias and lack of due process, and upheld the tribunal's factual findings. Both Respondents were found to have acted dishonestly and were struck off the roll and ordered to bear costs.

Duties found breached:

• No improper benefit, loan or bequest
• No improper use of client money
• No baseless or threatened misconduct report

Aggravating factors:

• Elaborate scheme to disguise payments using client as conduit so it could not be traced to firm's account
• Taking advantage of client's trust and her fear of her former partner
• Instructing client to lie to her banker that payment was for 'investment purposes'
• No remorse shown; repeated trivial and unacceptable excuses to delay and obstruct proceedings
• Refusal to return the money when demanded