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A sole director submitted false Legal Aid claims, including billing for six hours in court despite appearing for just seven minutes.
Razaan Mosaval, sole director of Crescent Legal in Perth, agreed to a finding of professional misconduct and unsatisfactory professional conduct for behaviour that included inflating Legal Aid grants and making misleading statements to an opposing party.
The West Australian State Administrative Tribunal (WASAT) was told Mosaval submitted eight false or misleading claims to Legal Aid between December 2018 and January 2020 for legal services that were not performed or for disbursements that were not incurred.
In one example from June 2018, Mosaval received $840 for six hours in the Family Court; in reality, she appeared within a courtroom for only three minutes on one day and four minutes on another.
In an audit, Mosaval claimed the second hearing lasted two hours.
Mosaval also claimed $252 for travel time to prison – plus a further $120 for disbursements – despite never attending the prison.
Between October 2019 and February 2020, Mosaval engaged in professional misconduct by causing or permitting a practitioner of her firm – who was not a member of a Legal Aid panel – to appear in matters that were subject to a Legal Aid grant.
Each of the payments was false or misleading in that they claimed the work had been performed by Mosaval instead.
Mosaval was also disciplined for making false statements to family members of the opposing party about the outcome of a hearing.
Before the magistrate, Mosaval had accepted that her client would not attend her former partner’s home and would instead arrange for removalists to collect her belongings.
However, in an email to the opposing party’s sister, Mosaval claimed the magistrate stated her client could attend the property with police.
When she received pushback, Mosaval insisted she had another lawyer contact the court for a transcript and claimed the magistrate was following a “previous ruling” about having a police escort.
The unsatisfactory professional conduct finding related to her failure to provide or cause Crescent Legal to provide a costs disclosure.
Citation: Legal Services and Complaints Committee and Mosaval [2024] VR 19.
