Law office obligated to return clients Dhs439,000

Abdulrahman Saeed, Staff Reporter

Abu Dhabi Court for Family, Civil and Administrative Cases obligated the owner of a law firm to return Dhs439,873 to a number of company owners who had agreed with the firm to represent them in several cases.

The company owners reportedly granted the firm an official power of attorney to do so, and paid fees of these cases but after the power of attorney was abolished and the owner of the law firm did not return the amount paid to him.

The details date back to an earlier time when a number of company owners filed a lawsuit against the owner of a law firm, requesting that he be obligated to return Dhs439,873, part of which they paid to him as lawsuit fees, but he transferred the amount to his personal account.

The plaintiffs also demanded that he be obligated to pay Dhs65,000 in compensation for the material and moral damages they incurred, in addition to the fees and expenses of the lawsuit and lawyer’s fees.

One of the plaintiffs said that he owns several companies and he agreed with the appellee to represent his companies in several cases and granted him an official power of attorney and paid Dhs1,768,765, as lawsuit expenses and fees, of which he paid Dhs1,328,892, and kept the remaining amount for himself and refused to return it even after canceling the power of attorney.

The court explained that the civil court had ruled that the appellee received an amount of money in excess of the legal fees according to a previous ruling and the expert’s report, and then obligated him to return the amount to the plaintiffs.