Durban - When disbarred Durban attorney Ian Stokes used R5.7 million of his clients’ funds, he had the necessary intention to steal the money, the Pietermaritzburg High Court found on Thursday.
Stokes was convicted of the charge of “theft by general deficiency” of the amount.
The theft took place between June 1998 and October 2000 while he was running a law firm and a separate business dealing in Road Accident Fund claims in La Lucia Ridge, Durban.
Judge Esther Steyn extended his bail conditions until October when evidence on pre-sentencing will be led.
She said she was satisfied that he had justified the extension of his bail and attached stringent conditions: that he had to report to the Umhlanga satellite police station twice a week, on Tuesdays and Saturdays, and that he had to tell the investigating officer of any travel arrangements. No travel would be undertaken unless he had permission.
He was also not allowed to apply for any travel documents.
Steyn found that when Stokes used the money from his trust accounts, he did not have sufficient funds to meet the demands of his creditors.
There was no doubt as to the purpose of the deposits into his trust account and what he had to use the money for.
“That much he realised at the time when he used the money, knowing that it did not belong to him and that he had no authority to use the money. There is no evidence that can be relied on that he was entitled to use the money. He appropriated the money and used it contrary to the terms of the entrustment of the complainants.”
She said the State’s evidence became more compelling when it was weighed against the improbabilities of Stokes’s version.
As a practising attorney, he claimed he was watching over his accounting books like a hawk to the extent that he could ascertain that he had a liquid fund to meet his payments.
“How this could be true or probable given his Mercantile trust account’s status is a mystery.
“The account was overdrawn for nearly six months, peaking at R603 000. If the practice was doing so well, then it does not explain why he would sell the practice for R100.”
In November 2000, Stokes fled the country and was traced to Atlanta, Georgia, where he was placed under provisional arrest pending the granting of an extradition order.
He returned to South Africa in March 2004.
The judge said the probability as to why he fled was that it was a desperate attempt to evade justice. If he was convinced he was truly in danger, the probabilities would have been that he would have gone into hiding after “threats” were issued, for the sake of his own safety.
The Mercury