Law Times

www.lawtimesnews.com Page 20 march 17/24, 2008 / Law Times LSUC FINES MEMBER $50,000 Toronto lawyer Aaron Lang has been ordered by a hearing panel to pay the Law Society of Upper Canada $50,000 for professional misconduct. Lang admitted to the panel that he "failed to be on guard against assisting in dishonest or fraudulent conduct to obtain mortgage funds under false pretences" in a series of transactions. He also admitted the improper conduct was conducted by "unscrupulous clients or individuals associated with them." Lang admitted that he should have known about the improper conduct but had delegated his real estate practice to his law clerk. The improper conduct involves 12 transactions that closed between August 1998 and July 2002, in which over $2.4 million in mortgage funding was procured, according to agreed facts included in the panel decision. On Feb. 19, the panel ordered Lang to pay the law society the $50,000 on specified terms. His licence to practise will be suspended if he doesn't follow the payment schedule. LAWYER DISBARRED Emmanuel Yao-Asumang-Adu Asare has been disbarred and ordered by a law society hearing panel to pay $12,000 in costs after being found to have engaged in professional misconduct. The Toronto lawyer's mis- conduct included "participating and/or knowingly assisting in dishonest or fraudulent conduct to obtain mortgage transactions . . . involving four properties," according to the law society, which released its decision in the matter on Feb. 12. Asare was not present at the hearing and was not represented. OGILVY RENAULT CHIPS IN York University's Building Osgoode campaign has received a shot in the arm from Ogilvy Renault LLP, in the form of a $300,000 donation. "We are committed to help Osgoode's students learn and build their future in today's technologically demanding, global marketplace," said Jacques Demers, managing partner of the firm's Toronto office. "We are indeed fortunate, as many of our firm's leaders are Osgoode alumni, and places like the Ogilvy Renault classroom are where tomorrow's leaders in law will come from. We are very pleased to invest in them." The firm's gift will be put towards a technology-enhanced classroom at Osgoode Hall Law School. The room, which will include the refurbishment of an older classroom, will be professionally designed and include 95 seats, with excellent acoustics and lighting, comfortable furniture, and electronic learning tools. Osgoode Dean Patrick Monahan said the Ogilvy Renault classroom "will provide a richer learning experience for Osgoode students. Ogilvy Renault has demonstrated a strong commitment to Canadian legal education and we are very grateful to the firm for helping to ensure that our students have a learning environment of the highest quality." OTTAWA U WINS MOOT A team from the University of Ottawa Law School claimed the country's top bilingual mooting title earlier this month by winning the Fraser Milner Casgrain LLP- sponsored Gale Cup Moot. "This year's moot highlighted the exceptional talent in oral advocacy across the country," said FMC Toronto managing partner Chris Pinnington. Teams in the competition debated the Supreme Court of Canada's 2007 ruling in R. v. Clayton, which addressed police detention and search powers. The Ottawa team swept the competition, taking home the Peter Cory Factum Prize on top of the Gale Cup, while team member James Tausendfreund claimed the Dickson Medal for outstanding oralist. "The Gale Cup Moot provides some of Canada's best law students with an invaluable opportunity to argue important issues in front of real judges from across the country," said FMC partner Frank Bowman. The Inside Story Confidential CEMETERY FULL, DEATH FORBIDDEN PAU, France — Gerard Lalanne, mayor of the French village of Sarpourenx, has banned residents from dying unless they own a plot in the local cemetery, which is inching toward capacity. "The first dead person to come along, I'll send him to the state's representative," Lalanne told Agence France- Presse. The mayor of the village of 260 people says the decree is a response to a legal ruling that kept him from expanding the cemetery. "It is forbidden for any person not having a plot in the cemetery . . . to die on the territory of the village," the order states. It promises "severe punishment" for those who disobey. Lalanne's stand matches one taken last year by the mayor of the French village of Cugnaux, who successfully used the tactic to get the go-ahead to expand his village's cemetery. STUDENT GETS SKITTLES PARDON NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Grade 8 honours student Michael Sheridan avoided what could have been a permanent — yet rainbow- coloured — stain on his record when he was returned to his post as class vice president after being caught with contraband candy. School board superintendent Reginald Mayo and principal Eleanor Turner met with Sheridan's parents to tell them their son's record would be cleared and he would be restored to the position, reports the Associated Press. Sheridan was suspended for a day, forbidden from attending an honours dinner, and lost his title of class vice president after being found buying a bag of Skittles from one of his peers. The classmate also received a pardon. New Haven schools banned the sale of candy in 2003 to promote wellness. Turner apologized for the incident. "My hope is that we can get back to the normal school routine, especially since we are in the middle of taking the Connecticut mastery test," she said. WOMAN FINED FOR PINK POODLE BOULDER, Colo. — A woman has been cited by animal-control officers for allegedly using beet juice to dye her poodle pink to promote breast-cancer research. "Cici will be pink until they kick us out of the city of Boulder," Joy Douglas, who owns a salon, told the Rocky Mountain News. Douglas says she's facing a $1,000 fine and could receive jail time. Animal control officers said they ticketed Douglas after suspecting that she contravened the city bylaw, "Dyeing foul and rabbits prohibited." The officers say Douglas was the target of many citizen complaints and received warnings before the ticket was handed out. "This is a gross mis- representation of the law," said Douglas. "I really don't think I'll be fined in the end." Some people in the city have accused Douglas of lying about her reason for dying her pooch pink in an effort to avoid the allegations. But Douglas denied the allegations, and said she only uses organic hair dyes on her pets. "In the past, we have tried other kinds of stains and Kool- Aids," she said. "But we never used hair dye that would cause a reaction." BURSTING THROUGH THE JAILHOUSE BARS ROME — A 462-pound accused Mafioso was put on house arrest after a Sicilian court ruled he was too fat to be housed in any Italian jails. Salvatore Ferranti had spent six months in four prisons, and some guards had complained he needed too much help getting his clothes on and off, going to the washroom, and generally getting around, reports Reuters Africa. The guards said beds were too small for him, bathroom doors were too tight, and they had concerns about their ability to transport him to a hospital if an emergency arose. Ferranti's lawyer successfully argued at a Palermo court that his client suffered from "grave obesity" that should be considered "a pathology incompatible with prison." Ferranti was allegedly a member of a mob clan formerly led by the "boss of bosses," Salvatore Lo Piccolo, who has since been arrested. Bizarre Briefs By Viola James Enabling Lawyers through Technology Tel: 416.322.6111 Toll-free: 1.866.367.7648 www doprocess com For more Inside Story, please visit www.lawtimesnews.com Law Office Essentials Dye & Durham's popular Philips Digital Pocket Memo LFH9600 comes with voice comands, on-board file encryption and password protection are but a few of the powerful features of the 9600. Ergonomic design lends itself to unparalleled user friendliness to create dictations. Packaged with SpeechExec Pro Dictate, the network-based dictation software and a docking station for uploading your files, the new 9600 is the ultimate in digital dictation. 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