3 1/2-year prison term for law firm partner

Press, 12 April 1984, Page 13

3 1/2-year prison term for law firm partner

PA Auckland A former partner in an Auckland law firm was yesterday sentenced to 3% years jail on nine charges of dishonesty involving clients’ funds.

Alan John Pickering, aged 34, of Glendowie, had previously been fined $23,000 by the Law Society. ' The lawyer, who pleaded guilty to the charges, had also been struck off the role of practitioners, Mr Justice Thorpe was told in the High Court at Auckland. The ■ offence occurred while Pickering was a part-

ner in the Auckland firm of Hesketh and Richmond. His Honour said that the offences were committed while Pickering was a member of an old and wellrespected firm. The first charge involved theft by misappropriation of $235,000 between February, 1982, and July, 1983, he said.

The second charge involved theft of cheques totalling more than $15,000 and seven further charges related to forgery in respect of cheques and an agreement for completion of sale and purchase of a property. Unlike most cases of that

type all the money had been recovered because it had been invested in real estate. His Honour declined an application by counsel for the Crown to suppress the name of Pickering’s former company. Earlier, counsel for Pickering, Mr Roger Maclaren, said Pickering acknowledged the seriousness of the offences but regarded them more as “unauthorised borrowing.” There was no definite plan of deception by Pickering who was now ruined both financially and professionally.