Don’t threaten lawyers: Kandakasi

NATIONAL Court judge Justice Ambeng Kandakasi has warned a packed court room yesterday that he will not tolerate people making threats against lawyers on cases that were before him.
Justice Kandakasi said this following the alleged threats by two men against two law firms over which
had assisted in the payment of a large sum of money for a deceased’s relative.
The court was told that the two were supporters of the late Andrew Kumbakali and were assisting the deceased’s relatives to pursue a proceedings against a lawyer and his law firm for alleged fraud involving an amount of K91,000.
This amount was part of a K151,000 payment made to Kumbakali’s relatives following an earlier court ruling where the lawyer assisted Kumbakali.
However, the relatives sued the law firm, Karri Lawyers, and another law firm, Ame Lawyers, who had also assisted in the previous matter.
The court was told that part of the money was paid into Karri Lawyers’ account after consent forms were signed by Ame Lawyers.
However, Karri Lawyers argued that it was a creditor to the payment and proper procedures were taken between all parties before the transactions were made and nothing was wrong.
Ame Lawyers argued that it acted upon written documents before signing the consent forms for the transaction.
Justice Kandakasi ordered that all parties, including individual plaintiffs, to sit together and come to a common understanding and work out the issues first before returning to court.
He also warned the two men not to issue threats when matters were before his court or other orders would be issued against them.
He adjourned the matter to a later date.