The Cape Law Society applied to the Cape High Court this week to disbar attorney Hoosain Mohammed for allegedly pocketing millions of rands from indigent road accident victims from the Cape Flats.
The application was brought on the basis that Mohammed’s law firm not only violated law society rules but also improperly loaned money from a trust account established for a victim. Investigative journalist and editor of noseWEEK Martin Welz and the Mail & Guardian exposed earlier this year how the Athlone-based law firm H Mohammed & Associates operated a fraudulent scheme to siphon off funds from pay-outs of the government’s Road Accident Fund to road accident victims.
In an affidavit to the court Welz alleged the law firm obtained hefty insurance pay- outs for accident victims, only to cream off large portions of the money for itself. In addition, the firm has been accused of keeping its clients in the dark about what they are really owed. Mohammed has since resigned from the firm, which still carries his name. The exposure of the scam led legal observers to say it was not an isolated case.
Since then the Road Accident Fund has referred many complaints to law societies. After the M&G article, then minister of transport Mac Maharaj ordered an inquiry into the fund’s administration. Maharaj’s last White Paper included a proposal which would have forced attorneys to disclose how they determined a particular portion of their fees in such cases, which until now has not been regulated.
Other proposed changes would have meant a reduced role and lower fees for lawyers, but also lower pay-outs for accident victims in an attempt to curb the fund’s R8-billion deficit. The reform programme was effectively abandoned after vigorous lobbying by the legal profession.
On Tuesday, Welz and one of the victims, Freddie Yalezo, asked the Cape High Court to extend an order for the safekeeping of files seized from H Mohammed & Associate’s offices in February. The files are being kept at court. They argued the files could be tampered with as an employee of the law firm already tried to conceal some of them during the February raid.
Documents were found behind mirror panels in the office of the senior partner and in a private, marble-lined toilet. Other bundles were found outside the building on the fire escape in black plastic bags. The applicants maintain the files are vital to a class action suit brought on behalf of 19 people against Mohammed.
H Mohammed & Associates is opposing the application, saying the files were unlawfully removed and that this is part of a sustained campaign against the well-known Cape Flats attorney. The matter has been postponed to September 20.