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Shamed lawyer caught out again

A Canadian lawyer struck off 17 years ago for acting “like a weasel in a hen house” has been charged with allegedly pretending to be lawyer in good standing in recent criminal cases._x000D_

user iconDigital 04 April 2013 SME Law
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A Canadian lawyer struck off 17 years ago for acting “like a weasel in a hen house” has been charged with allegedly pretending to be lawyer in good standing in recent criminal cases.

Sixty five-year-old Howard William Cohen was charged with fraud and obstruction of justice after being under investigation by Durham Regional Police since November, reports The Globe and Mail.

The ex-lawyer might have suffered a bout of forgetfulness when he allegedly misrepresented himself in court, twice; in November 2011 and November 2012. But Folklaw isn’t giving this old timer the benefit of the doubt.

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In April 1996, he was disbarred and sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison after being found to have convinced elderly neighbours to invest large chunks of their life savings in non-existent mortgages.

One unsuspecting victim had Alzheimer’s disease and others suffered long-term damage to their health as a result of Cohen’s trickery.

The all-too-crafty attorney forged mortgage documents and embezzled more than $800 000 from elderly clients.

He later asserted that he had simply borrowed the money and intended to repay. But given the court heard he was a compulsive, pathological gambler, this testimony seems rather delusional.

Prosecutors at the time went on to describe Cohen as a weasel cloaked in the status of the legal profession.

Folklaw reckons that cloak turns more invisible with every story like this ... but will they ever stop rolling in?

Cohen has been free on bail since his most recent arrest in November for allegedly misrepresenting himself in court in two drink driving cases.

Cohen has pleaded not guilty and is set to appear in an Oshawa court later this month, but Folklaw doubts he’ll weasel his way out of the big house.

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