View source for Law Society of Singapore v Lee Suet Fern

{{Short description|2020 Singapore disciplinary proceedings against lawyer Lee Suet Fern}}
'''''Law Society of Singapore v Lee Suet Fern (Lim Suet Fern)''''' [2020] SGHC 255 was a disciplinary proceeding brought by the Law Society of Singapore against senior lawyer Lee Suet Fern, wife of [[Lee Hsien Yang]], over her role in preparing and executing the last will of her father-in-law, founding Prime Minister [[Lee Kuan Yew]]. The Law Society sought to have Lee struck off the roll of advocates and solicitors; the Court of Three Judges instead found her guilty of a lesser misconduct charge and suspended her from practice for 15 months.
{{Infobox-lawsuit
| court = Court of Three Judges (Originating Summons No 2 of 2020)
| applicant = Law Society of Singapore
| respondent = Lee Suet Fern (alias Lim Suet Fern), advocate and solicitor of 37 years' standing, then a director of Morgan Lewis Stamford LLC
| underlying_act = Participation in the preparation and execution of Lee Kuan Yew's last will, 16–17 December 2013
| charge = Breach of Rules 25(a)/25(b) and Rule 46 of the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct) Rules, charged in the alternative down to misconduct unbefitting an advocate and solicitor under s 83(2)(h) of the Legal Profession Act
| key_dates = AGC complaint to Law Society: 4 December 2018; Law Society Statement of Case: 1 February 2019; Disciplinary Tribunal appointed: 13 February 2019; DT hearing: 1–5 July 2020; DT findings (guilty): [2020] SGDT 1; Court of Three Judges hearing: 13 August 2020; judgment: 20 November 2020
| citation = [2020] SGHC 255
| outcome = Acquitted on Charges 1, 1A, 2 and 2A (no solicitor-client relationship established); found guilty on the further alternative charges of misconduct unbefitting an advocate and solicitor (s 83(2)(h)); suspended from practice for 15 months; decision not appealable
| related_cases = Disciplinary Tribunal proceedings against Kwa Kim Li over the same will (DT 19 of 2022)
}}
== Background ==
Between 20 August 2011 and 2 November 2012, Lee Kuan Yew executed six successive wills, each prepared by his long-time solicitor Kwa Kim Li of Lee & Lee, reflecting his evolving wishes on how his estate — including the house at [[38 Oxley Road]] — should be divided among his three children, [[Lee Hsien Loong]], [[Lee Wei Ling]] and Lee Hsien Yang.<ref name="sghc255">''Law Society of Singapore v Lee Suet Fern (Lim Suet Fern)'' [2020] SGHC 255, at [4]–[6].</ref>
On 16–17 December 2013, Lee Kuan Yew executed a seventh and final will (the "Last Will"), which reinstated equal one-third shares for each child and removed a clause in earlier wills directing the demolition of the Oxley Road house. Lee Suet Fern, a lawyer by training and Lee Hsien Yang's wife, was involved in arranging the will's execution; Kwa Kim Li, who had prepared the six earlier wills, was not the one who drafted or was present for the execution of this final version. Lee Kuan Yew died on 23 March 2015, and probate on the Last Will was granted without opposition in October 2015, with Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Wei Ling as executors.<ref name="sghc255"/>
The circumstances of the Last Will's preparation became a matter of public dispute in 2017, when a rift broke out between Lee Hsien Loong and his younger siblings over the fate of 38 Oxley Road, feeding into the wider [[Lee family (Singapore)|Lee family]] feud that also produced the contempt-of-court case against [[Li Shengwu contempt of court case|Li Shengwu]] and a defamation suit against [[Online Citizen]] editor Terry Xu.
== Proceedings ==
=== Referral and charges ===
On 4 December 2018, the [[Attorney-General of Singapore|Attorney-General's Chambers]] (AGC) filed a complaint with the Law Society alleging Lee had potentially breached Rules 25 and 46 of the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct) Rules by preparing the Last Will without advising Lee Kuan Yew to seek independent legal advice, despite knowing her husband stood to receive a significant share of the estate under it.<ref name="sghc255"/> As the complaint originated from the AGC, the Law Society was statutorily required to apply for a Disciplinary Tribunal (DT) to be appointed, which occurred on 13 February 2019.
The Law Society preferred two charges against Lee, each with an alternative and a further alternative: Charge 1 (and alternatives 1A/1B) concerned an alleged failure to advance Lee Kuan Yew's interest unaffected by her own or her husband's interest, in breach of Rule 25; Charge 2 (and alternatives 2A/2B) concerned acting in connection with a "significant gift" to a family member (her husband's one-third share) without advising Lee Kuan Yew to seek independent advice, in breach of Rule 46. The further alternative charges under each (1B and 2B) were framed instead as misconduct unbefitting an advocate and solicitor under s 83(2)(h) of the Legal Profession Act, which does not require proof of a solicitor-client relationship.
=== Disciplinary Tribunal findings ===
Following a five-day hearing from 1 to 5 July 2020, the DT found Lee guilty of all charges, holding that an implied retainer — and therefore a solicitor-client relationship — existed between Lee and Lee Kuan Yew. The DT's findings rested partly on Lee Hsien Yang's earlier statement to a ministerial committee that Lee Suet Fern had taken instructions from Lee Kuan Yew on the will, on Kwa Kim Li having been removed from correspondence concerning the final will, and on Lee Kuan Yew's apparent belief that Lee Suet Fern had been primarily responsible for drafting it.
=== Court of Three Judges judgment ===
The Court of Three Judges — Chief Justice [[Sundaresh Menon]], Judge of Appeal Judith Prakash, and Justice Woo Bih Li — heard the matter on 13 August 2020 and delivered judgment on 20 November 2020. The court departed from several of the DT's findings, holding that Lee did not receive instructions directly from Lee Kuan Yew and that no implied retainer, and hence no solicitor-client relationship, had been established between them.<ref name="sghc255"/>
Because Rules 25 and 46 both presuppose a solicitor-client relationship, the court held the Law Society could not establish that Charges 1, 1A, 2 or 2A had been made out, and acquitted Lee of those charges.<ref name="sghc255"/> However, the court agreed that Lee was guilty of the further alternative charges under s 83(2)(h) — misconduct unbefitting an advocate and solicitor — for allowing Lee Kuan Yew to execute his final will without having personally verified his instructions or advising him that she was not in a position to do so, compounded by her husband's position as "a significant beneficiary" under that will.
On sanction, the court assessed the harm caused as "at the lower end of the moderate range", noting that Lee Kuan Yew appeared "content" with the Last Will — he lived more than a year afterward without revisiting it, save for a codicil bequeathing two carpets to Lee Hsien Yang — and that he was "not an unsophisticated client". Drawing comparisons with ''Law Society of Singapore v Ahmad Khalis bin Abdul Ghani'' [2006] 4 SLR(R) 308, the court held that the presumptive sanction of striking off would be "disproportionate" given the absence of an actual solicitor-client relationship, and ordered a 15-month suspension from practice instead.<ref name="sghc255"/> The decision, from Singapore's apex disciplinary body for the legal profession, could not be appealed.
== Reactions ==
In a statement following the judgment, Lee Suet Fern said she disagreed with the decision, arguing there had been no basis for the case to be brought over what she characterised as a private family will: Lee Kuan Yew "knew what he wanted. He got what he wanted", was never found by the court to lack capacity, and could have made a further will himself, as he had done several times before, if the Last Will did not reflect his wishes. She noted that no complaint had been raised by Lee Kuan Yew, any beneficiary, or Kwa Kim Li during his lifetime, that the case arose only from a later AGC complaint, and that Lee Hsien Loong had made submissions in the proceedings without testifying or being cross-examined. She also noted that probate had been granted in 2015 partly at the urging of Lee Hsien Loong and his lawyer, Lucien Wong, before Wong became Attorney-General.
== Related proceedings: Kwa Kim Li disciplinary case ==
{{Main|Law Society of Singapore v Kwa Kim Li}}
A separate Disciplinary Tribunal matter (DT 19 of 2022) examined the conduct of Kwa Kim Li, the lawyer who had prepared Lee Kuan Yew's first six wills, arising from a complaint filed by Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Wei Ling in September 2019. In a report dated 5 May 2023, the DT found that Kwa had misled the executors of the estate by omitting, in June 2015 correspondence, her communications with Lee Kuan Yew between November and mid-December 2013 about his intended changes to his will, and had separately breached client confidentiality by disclosing details of the earlier wills to Lee Hsien Loong, who was not an executor. Kwa was fined a total of S$13,000 and ordered to pay costs and disbursements. The case is treated in full in its own article, given its distinct procedural history and its bearing on conflicting public statements Kwa and Lee Hsien Yang had made in 2017 about who instructed the drafting of the Last Will.
== See also ==
* [[Lee family (Singapore)]]
* [[38 Oxley Road]]
* [[Lee Hsien Yang]]
* [[Lee Hsien Loong]]
* [[Li Shengwu contempt of court case]]
* [[Law Society of Singapore v Kwa Kim Li]]
== References ==
{{Reflist}}
[[Category:2020 in Singapore]]
[[Category:Singapore legal profession disciplinary cases]]
[[Category:Lee family (Singapore)]]