A DUNDALK solicitor with “an appalling record of fraud and dishonesty” relating to millions of euro in property dealings has been struck off by the president of the High Court.
Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns also directed that Joseph Traynor, formerly practising as Traynor and Co Solicitors, Clanbrassil Street, Dundalk, Co Louth, must pay restitution to his victims, mostly banks, while his passport is to be impounded by the Garda. Papers in the case have already been referred to the DPP, the court was told.
The court heard one of Mr Traynor’s fraudulent transactions related to the creation of a fictitious contract, using forged signatures, to buy lands for €7 million in Castlewarden, Naas, when there was an existing contract for €4.6 million for the same lands.
In six other cases, he failed to comply with solicitors’ undertakings in relation to property dealings involving €2.27 million, the court heard.
While most of those cases affected financial institutions, one involved failure to honour an undertaking to a man to discharge an €800,000 mortgage from the sale of lands in October 2006 at Tullydonnell, Ardee, Co Louth.
The proceeds were to be paid to ACCBank, but this never occurred, and the land’s seller was left out of pocket for €800,000, Paul Anthony McDermott, for the Law Society said.
Mr Justice Kearns upheld a recommendation the man be paid €800,000 in restitution in accordance with a recommendation by a Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.
Applying to strike Mr Traynor off the roll of solicitors, Mr McDermott said he had “an appalling record of fraud and dishonesty”.
Francis Stafford Quinn, for Mr Traynor, said his client was neither opposing nor consenting to the strike-off orders and he was “in the court’s hands”. What was involved was “a litany of sadness”, Mr Quinn said.
Mr Justice Kearns said it was “a litany of the most appalling behaviour by a professional person”. The court had to take a very serious view “of certain events that have occurred in the past” and he was ordering that Mr Traynor’s passport be impounded by the Garda, the judge said.
The court heard Mr Traynor had either failed to turn up at tribunal inquiries into the charges against him or, when he was represented, the instructions provided to his counsel did not go beyond a simple denial of the allegations.
The disciplinary tribunal also found Mr Traynor guilty of misconduct in relation to a €630,000 stamp duty payment on the Castlewarden lands by failing to honour his undertaking to stamp the deed of transfer.
In another case, Mr Traynor failed to register a mortgage for €570,000 advanced by Start Mortgages Ltd for a client for land in Lislin, Mullagh, Co Cavan.
The court ordered Mr Traynor make restitution to all parties.