Wirick
George Orwell's book "
Animal Farm" is about farm animals who decide they can get rid of their human rulers and have a better life ruling themselves. Their revolt against their human owner succeeds.
To guarantee the rights of individual animals a list of commandments was posted on the barn wall. As time passed the pigs, who had became the ruling class due to their intelligence, altered the commandments to allow themselves privileges and power that were initially forbidden.
The alterations were never announced. They were always discovered later by the animals who came to look at it after noticing the exercise of those privileges and power by the pigs.
Can we safely say that those sitting in position of power, like the Attorney General, the judiciary and the lawyers make new rules as they go along like the pigs in
Animal Farm?
J4Y suggest that with an amount as high as
11,000 lawyers only in the province of British Columbia, the
LAW SOCIETY OF B.C (LSBC), and its members are the pigs in the animal farm!
CANADA SOFT ON WHITE COLLAR CRIME
Martin Wirick was one of those lawyers, acting like a
free range pig, and the
LSBC and the bench, knew or must have known of his criminal conduct, but did nothing about it, until the banks reported him.
In
Firstline Trust Co. (Principal Subsidiarie of CIBC v. Mills 2000 BCSC 226 Madam
Justice Wendy Baker, who before being appointed to the BC Surpeme Court, was with
Davies and Company, a lawfirm that acted for
CIBC, clearly assisted
MARTIN WIRICK in a mortgage fraud against an octogenerian of 84 years of age -
Mrs. Ruby Mills.
After successfully concluding the case of
Firstline Trust Co. (Principal Subsidiarie of CIBC v. Mills 2000 BCSC 226
Martin Wirick,
continued on to
do more than 200 mortgage fraud.
Since the
Wirick scandal, the Law Societies across Canada have been working hard in making it easier for lawyers to fraud.
For example,
in 2001, the
LSBC and the
Canadian Bar Association successfully argued, before
Madam Justice Allan of the BC Supreme Court and subsequently before
Lance Finch-Chief Justice of British Columbia that the constitutionality of a new legislation by the
Federal Government, which would have forced lawyers accross Canada to alert authorities to suspicious transactions by their clients, would threatened
solicitor-client-privilege.
Other Justices across Canada followed the courts of first instance in B.C. by deciding that,
Legal counsel are exempt from the application of s. 5 of the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering), Suspicious Transaction Reporting Regulations.
Since the bar across Canada were successful in being exempt from reporting suspicious transactions, it is now trying to get the government of B.C. and eventually the government of Canada to agree with their
MANDATORY E-FILING AT THE LTO without the requirement, inter alia, of the buyers and sellers signatures.
It is a natural progression, after lawyers were exempt by the courts, to not report suspicious transactions from their clients that,
Law Societies accross Canada would go one step further in
MONEY LAUNDERING FROM PROCEEDS OF CRIME by having complete control of the
Land Title Offices and by having a law that would obligate lawyers to file property transfers electronically.
In the case of Wirick, he used his lawyer's undertaking
Admission of Criminal Breach of Trust to help create a complex web of interrelated real estate financings and sales, which did not give the title promised and received funds from other lawyers, on his undertaking to convey good title and pay off existing encumbrances.
The
B.C. Real Estate practice was set up then in a way that, long after a conveyance was thought to be complete, the purchasers' and the financial institutions' lawyers still did not have confirmation of clear title. Something the
LSBC is trying to change by having the government agree with their
MANDATORY E-FILING AT THE LTO.
The result in the Wirick case was that a great many innocent purchasers, who have given good value to purchase homes, find their properties encumbered by undischarged mortgages and under threat of foreclosure.
Wirick was a victim of his own demise, since he evidently did not directly involve financial institutions and other members of the bar in his crime, as most others do, and as a result the banks,
Van City and
HSBC, the biggest creditors, reported him to the authorities.
In order to get shelter from paying back the money he stole, Wirick was assigned into bankruptcy by
E.SANDS & ASSOCIATES and in December of 2002, Wirick was disbarred.
According to documents filed in court, on Sept. 15, 2003, Wirick's lawyer, which was allegedly opposed by the
LSBC,
HSBC and
Vancouver City Savings Credit Union, filed an application for
a discharge from bankruptcy.
Justice Jon Sigurdson, of the
B.C. Supreme Court, who was seized to the matter, had not decided as to the question of whether Wirick had been guilty of
fraud or
fraudulent breach of trust.
However on
August 3, 2004, Justice Sigurdson did find Wirick guilty of
fraudulent breach of trust.
Admission from Wirick of Criminal Breach of Trust
Since then a senior retired lawyer,
ANTHONY J. JASICH who practiced law for almost 50 years, began sending letters to the authorities to charge Wirick with
Criminal Breach of Trust.
Note when you click on
ANTHONY J. JASICH you can read on how the
LSBC decided to cite Mr. Jasich for not keeping the
code of silence, against members of the bar, engaged in fraud.
In the case of Wirick, no lawyers of British Columbia, invoked
Rule 1-44 of the Law Society Rule by laying a
private information against Mr. Wirick in the criminal court, even though the law society had enough evidence to show probable cause.
It took in fact six years for the Crown to charge Wirick with fraud and on
August 2008, the Crown
failed to charge Wirick with the most
obvious crime of
criminal breach of trust.
A
letter, dated Sept. 12, 2008 to the
Attorney General of BC and the
Law Society of B.C. was delivered by Ms. Zanetti, setting up the facts of the evidence, which the Crown overlooked to charge Wirick with criminal breach of trust.
WIRICK'S SENTENCING was scheduled for June 5, 2009.
During the sentencing hearing, Crown counsel,
Kevin Gillett, when making his submissions, failed to bring up
Wirick's statutory declaration
Further while
Kevin Gillett submitted to the court that
Justice Sigurdson had ordered, in the bankruptcy proceedings, that Wirick consented to a judgment in the amount of
$500,000 in favour of the
LSBC, he wittingly or unwittingly concealed the fact, to the sentencing judge,
Patrick Dohm, that,
the entered order of Sigurdson, J. was violated, since on November 22, 2006, the lawyer for Wirick, with the consent of the lawyer for the LSBC ended up going before Master Taylor, obtaining a
Consent Judgment in favour of E. SANDS & ASSOCIATES contrary to the entered order of Judge Sigurdson.
Having the consent judgment in favour of the trustee, means the trustee discharged himself from Wirick's bankruptcy and Wirick was also discharged from his bankruptcy, notwitstanding the fact that Justice Sigurdson had said in his decision on June 27, 2006 that, "Perhaps the only way that Mr. Wirick will ever pay anything to the Law Society is if he wins the lottery..."
The action of the lawyers on both sides was contrary to court procedures and in fact in violation of the law.
It is to be noted that the lawyer representing the LSBC Christopher Ramsay, is a lawyer that acts for insolvent companies, trustees, receivers, financial institutions, creditors and other stakeholders. Thus his allegiance was evidently with the trustee and not with his client.
A letter of response from Stuart Cameron of the LSBC, was delivered to Mr. ANTHONY J. JASICH. trying to justify the action of the bar in using the bench for their own benefit. However once an order is entered, as in the case with Wirick, it cannot be varied, the only remedy for the lawyers is the appeal court.
On June 9th, 2009, Wirick was sentenced to 7 years after pleading guilty to what amounts to the biggest legal fraud in Canadian history. In the case of Wirick, the possibility of parole is,
DO NOT GO DIRECTLY TO JAIL, PASS GO and COLLECT YOUR MONEY.
Since the case of Wirick and another case of Bankruptcy and Mortgage Fraud wherein documents filed into court claims it involves CIBC and members of the bar, the Office of the Superintendent of Bankruptcy of Canada has limited the view of documents, that used to be public domain, to only lawyers.
Following are letters from retired lawyer ANTHONY J. JASICH. to different public bodies, which would explain as to why the LSBC is trying to silence him once and for all:
Note that it appears Mr. ANTHONY J. JASICH was the only tenacious lawyer in British Columbia and the whole of Canada that wrote to the police and to the Attorney General about their duties in charging Wirick criminally.
Letter to Chief of Police Jamie Graham from the lawyer, dated May 20, 2004;
Four different articles was attached to the correspondences to the Chief of Police:
Lawyer in fraud prove now a pet food baker Vancouver Sun
Legal fraud largest ever for commercial crime unit Vancouver Sun
Law Society's special fund provides payouts to victims Vancouver Sun
Canada, a haven for dirty money, conference told Globe and Mail
First letter to the Attorney General of BC Wally Oppal;
Second letter to the Attorney General of BC Wally Oppal dated August 19 2005
Letter from the Attorney General of British of Columbia in reply to the lawyer's letter, dated August 19, 2005
Letter from the RCMP Commercial Crime Section in reply to the lawyer's letter, dated Feb. 6, 2006
Letter to Sands Associates Trustee in Bankruptcy dated May 8 2006
Letter from Sands Associates in reply to the lawyer's letter of May 8th
Third letter to Attorney General of B.C. Wally Oppal dated July 24 2006
Letter to City Manager of City of Vancouver dated August 20 2006;
A Company Search was made by the lawyer and it appears that the new director of Koko's Gourmet Pet Food Ltd is Sharon Alexis Novak, who may be the new wife of Martin Wirick.
Lawyers like Wirick are not in any way uncommon. As Mr. ANTHONY J. JASICH. wrote in one of his letters to the Provincial Attorney General, "in researching my records, which are not exhaustive, I found the following members of the bar, as they then were, had also missapropriated client trust funds":
Bilhar Singh Koonar;
James Edwin Marks;
Jennifer Yew Ajec Tse;
Jill Mary Black;
Michael Custance;
William John Graham;
Jonathan Oldroyd
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THE SKALBANIA CASE IN RELATION TO THE WIRICK MATTER AND FOR OTHER MATTERS DEALING WITH THEFT:
The undertaking of Wirick, follows the principle of the Skalbania case--R vs. Skalbania [1997] S.C.C.), wherein mens rea --intent-- no longer is a prerequisite to find an accused guitly of fraud.
Nelson Skalbania was first acquitted by the trial judge at the British Columbia Supreme Court but at the BC Court of Appeal, Madam Justice Rowles over turned the lower court decison by concluding:
I find that Mr. Skalbania was at all material times the controlling mind of Prime Realty Limited, to whom Mr. Gooch's cheque was paid. I find that Mr. Skalbania through Prime Realty applied Gooch's money for a purpose other then that directed by Mr. Gooch.
And at the Supreme Court of Canada level, wherein the lawyer for Nelson Skalbania was Peter Leask Q.C. --who has been appointed this year as a B.C. Supreme Court Judge-- dismissed the appeal and affirm the conviction.
This means that:
"The mens rea of that offence does not require proof that the accused "subjectively intended to act dishonestly", as various older Canadian cases and English cases had suggested.
Rather, the of fraud was said to consist of:
"subjective awareness that one was undertaking a prohibited act (the deceit, falsehood or other dishonest act) which could cause deprivation in the sense of depriving another of property or putting that property at risk. If this is shown, the crime is complete".
The Supreme Court of Canada agreed with Rowles J.A. on the issue of intent in R vs. Skalbania.
Accordingly, the Wirick matter has called into question the value of a lawyer's undertaking - one of the foundation stones of professional practice.
By failing to charge Wirick with section 336 of the CCC, the Crown has showed that it only charged Wirick for "Bella Figura", which means to give an impression or an appearance that they are doing something for the public interest.
The pigs on the animal farms have been having too much fun at the expense of all others.
Wirick compensation Fund
Mortgage and Bankruptcy Fraud
Money Laundering
More on lawyers and banks involved in Mortgage Fraud