According to Vanguard news, a fake lawyer was apprehended in Port Harcourt, Rivers state during court proceedings at the High court. The impersonator who is known as Stanley Agiogbe was remanded in prison custody after it was discovered that he could not convince the court and the Nigerian Bar Association of his status as a legal practitioner.
Impersonation is an offence punishable under the Nigerian law especially in relation to the legal profession. In this article, we would examine three mistakes that the suspected fake lawyer committed which made it easy for him to be easily identified as an impostor.
The first mistake that the fake lawyer made was to ask questions on certain points of law in the courtroom. Before a lawyer goes to court for his matter, he is always prepared and is not expected to be caught unawares. A lawyer is not always ignorant especially when it comes to the issue of representing his client’s interest in court.
The second mistake the suspected fake lawyer made was to claim to be a senior lawyer of over ten years at the bar. The legal profession is a tightly knit one, and many lawyers get familiar with one another starting from their university days, to law school and even during practice.
For him to have claimed to be a senior lawyer, he would also be expected to ordinarily be quite familiar with rudiments of the law. Minute matters like a bounced cheque will not have been an issue for a supposed senior counsel.
The third mistake the fake lawyer made was his failure to make proper findings before appearing in court. Every lawyer has an enrollment number, and this makes it very easy to identify such a lawyer either by his client or other legal practitioners. When in doubt as whether or not a person is truly a legal practitioner, such person’s name can be checked on the database of the NBA.
Comment:*
Nickname*
E-mail*
Website
