On behalf of Raymond Giudice P.C. posted in Criminal Defense on Thursday, February 27, 2014.
A Fulton County magistrate on Wednesday issued a criminal warrant charging a Buckhead attorney with theft by conversion after a client claimed the lawyer had misappropriated more than $30,000.
Judge Melynee Leftridge issued a warrant against Robert T. Thompson Jr. of The Thompson Law Group. Leftridge set a $10,000 signature bond for Thompson, ordered him to report to the Fulton County Jail within the next 10 days, then bound the criminal case over to Fulton County Superior Court.
Leftridge’s ruling followed a six-hour hearing last week at which the judge heard testimony from witnesses who included several of Thompson’s former employees.
“We respectfully disagree with the judge’s ruling about probable cause,” said Thompson’s attorney, Ann Shafer, after the hearing. “We shall be going forward zealously to show that Mr. Thompson has done no wrongdoing, either by converting funds to his own use or by defrauding anyone. Mr. Thompson’s 38-year-old law practice and his respected reputation as a lawyer and a member of several of financial institutions speaks for itself.”
Shafer also said that Thompson client Michael Samadi, on whose accusation the warrant is based, had given the funds that are the subject of the warrant to Thompson to invest. “Mr. Thompson did so,” she said. Shafer added that those funds “have been locked in for a period of time.” She also asserted that Thompson already has paid Samadi back $31,000 of the $37,400 Samadi claimed he was owed and that Samadi “will be paid with 8 to 10 percent interest” once the remainder of the invested funds can be withdrawn without paying a penalty.
Shafer also said she intends “to get with the prosecutor’s office…and hopefully resolve the matter pre-indictment.”
Samadi told the Daily Report this week that he swore out the warrant last November after Thompson repeatedly refused to return $37,400 of Samadi’s money that had been deposited in the lawyer’s firm escrow account.
After Wednesday’s hearing, Samadi told the Daily Report, “I am happy that [the judge] finally agreed that justice should be served. Thompson, he added, has repaid only $13,000 of the $37,400 owed to him.
Thompson-whom a client once described as “like Robin Hood” because he has take on banks and mortgage companies in court on behalf of homeowners who were facing foreclosures-was sanctioned in January but U.S. District Senior Judge Charles Pannell for conduct the federal judge labeled “reprehensible” in a federal case unrelated to the Fulton County warrant.
Thompson, Pannell said in a Jan. 21 sanctions order, made serious claims that were “frivolous” and “without proper basis” against Atlanta attorney Kimberly Childs in a federal lawsuit Thompson filed in 2012 on behalf of Julie Chrisley, the majority owner of Chrisley Asset Management and Pacific Development Partners. Pannell ordered Thompson to reimburse Childs for nearly $28,000 she spent in defending herself against the suit. Thompson, whose firm had withdrawn from the case by the time Pannell issued his order, is appealing that ruling.
Samadi told the Daily Report that it was the lawyer’s reputation as a “Robin Hood” and his position as an adjunct law professor at Emory University that led him to hire Thompson to save a $450,000 residence he owned in Evans, Ga., from foreclosure by SunTrust Bank. Samadi was at the time embroiled in a dispute with the bank over $98,000 in mortgage payments that he claimed were not credited to his account by the bank. He said he owed the bank about $250,000 on the outstanding mortgage.
Samadi said he paid Thompson an $11,000 retainer. “From that point on,” said Samadi, “he didn’t do anything.” Samadi also said he begged Thompson to take action to stop the pending foreclosure, before seeking his own temporary restraining order to stop it. Samadi said the bank ignored the TRO, his residence was sold at a foreclosure auction, and he also lost more than $15,000 worth of furnishings that disappeared after the sale.
Samadi said that after the foreclosure sale, the bank in November 2012 returned a check he had sent to SunTrust for $37,400. He took it to Thompson, who, he said, persuaded him to deposit it in the firm escrow account so that it would be available if it were needed to settle what Samadi thought would be continuing litigation to reclaim his property.
Samadi said that he never asked Thompson to invest the funds for him and that from March until November of last year, when he swore out a warrant for Thompson’s arrest, he repeatedly pleaded with Thompson for the money.
Samadi said that at the probable cause hearing last week, where Samadi acted as his own attorney, he elicited testimony from Thompson that Thompson had no bank or investment statements to show where and how much of the money Thompson had invested.
Attorney David Martin, who worked for Thompson, said he quit last fall after Thompson asked him to fabricate billing records that would account for Samadi’s missing funds.
Martin said he testified against Thompson last week at the probable cause hearing on Samadi’s warrant, telling the court that he was directed by Thompson “to demonstrate that the $37,400 was spent for services rendered.”
Martin said he refused, calling the request “dishonest” because Samadi had already paid Thompson’s retainer in full.
Ayrn Sedore, Thompson’s former bookkeeper and legal assistant, told the Daily Report on Wednesday that she, too, testified as one of Samadi’s witnesses at the probably cause hearing last week. “I knew about the Samadi issue because I kept [Thompson’s] books at that point,” she said.
Sedore said that she told the court that within eight days of depositing Samadi’s funds in the firm escrow account, Thompson had spent all the money. She said that when Samadi began repeatedly asking for his money, Thompson in February 2013 sent her a text message saying that Samadi had asked for an additional $25,000 legal work that would essentially “erase” the $37 debt that Thompson owed him.
Sedore said that twice in the past year, Thompson has received notices from the State Bar of Georgia when his firm escrow accounts were overdrawn, inquiring as to why there was a negative balance.
Sedore also said that she and the rest of Thompson’s staff quit last fall because Thompson routinely “wasn’t making payroll.” Their final paychecks bounced, she said.
Sedore and Martin said that after they resigned, Thompson hired a new accountant whom he directed to swear out criminal warrants against them that accused them of theft. Sedore said she was accused of stealing law firm files. “No files were missing,” she said. “[The firm] had done a complete accounting of the files…There was no merit whatsoever.”
Shafer told the Daily Report after Wednesday’s hearing that “former disgruntled employees” whom Thompson told the newspaper he had dismissed for thievery have been calling former clients and “besmirching his character.”
Martin called the allegation and the attempt to secure a criminal warrant against him “absolutely ridiculous.”
After a probable cause hearing last December, Fulton County Chief Magistrate Judge Stephanie Davis dismissed the cases against Sedore and Martin from the bench, Sedore and Martin said. Sedore added that defending herself against her former boss’ allegations cost her $3,000 in legal fees and required her to make four court appearances.
At the conclusion of Wednesday’s hearing, Shafer asked Samadi if he had contacted one of Thompson’s clients, then warned him, “Mr. Thompson is going to be vindicated, and if you do, there is going to be a huge lawsuit.”
When Samadi replied, “I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Shafer responded, “Keep talking.”
Shafer told the Daily Report after the hearing that Samadi “is contacting Mr. Thompson’s present and past clients. He is smearing Mr. Thompson’s name and libeling him.” She said that while the charge against Thompson is pending, “We will proceed in the meantime with legal action against Mr. Samadi. He is already saying [Thompson]’s a criminal and a crook. I have warned him to cease and desist from that language.”
Source: Fulton Co. Daily Report
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