In a Nov. 27 decision, a law society tribunal review board determined that Hong Guo had not done enough to advance her review and therefore dismissed it.
A disgraced lawyer who ran for mayor of Richmond and was disbarred twice in separate disciplinary proceedings has had an appeal of one of those cases thrown out.
It ends a more-than-decade-long Law Society of B.C. disciplinary saga for Hong Guo as she did not file a review for her second disbarment.
“The respondent has been provided ample opportunity to proceed with her review, but has not done so. Her obligation to perfect the review and her failure to do so have been repeatedly brought to her attention. The respondent has provided no explanation for her inaction and there is no indication that she intends to proceed with the review,” wrote Gurminder Sandhu, an adjudicator with the law society’s tribunal.
A law society tribunal hearing panel said the disbarment decision was based on Guo’s “lengthy and serious disciplinary history consisting of numerous conduct issues covering different circumstances dating back to 2012.”
Guo had filed for a review to set aside the disbarment, arguing that the hearing panel had failed to give weight to factors supporting the conclusion that her conduct did not amount to professional misconduct, or that she should be fined and not disbarred.
In its 2023 decision, the hearing panel had written that four hearing panels had made wide-ranging findings of professional misconduct, including misappropriation and other mishandling of trust funds, breaches of trust accounting rules, conflicts of interest, misrepresentations and false representations to clients and the law society, failure to supervise staff, and breaches of undertakings and law society orders.
The panel said Guo met many aspects of the test for ungovernability, including a lengthy discipline history, repeated breaches to follow rulings, a consistent and repetitive failure to respond to the law society’s inquiries, and a pattern of misleading behaviour directed at both the law society and clients.
The review dismissal noted that the law society’s last successful communication with Guo was in February 2024.
The panel noted that Guo’s sister wrote to the law society advising that Guo is mentally ill and was mentally incapable of making any response to the application. The sister said she was “not going to pass any of your orders to (Guo)” and “(t)he best thing for her is to live a quiet life to recover.”
The panel ruling noted Guo had raised mental health in prior exchanges with the law society and before other hearing panels, but that she had not provided medical evidence demonstrating an inability to participate in this process.
With files from Postmedia News