High Court judge Itumeleng Segopolo has been dragged before court in a case in which a litigant wants him to account for P400 000 that was deposited in a trust account held by his former law firm.
Justice Segopolo has also been reported to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) and Law Society of Botswana (LSB) for judicial misconduct.
A defendant-cum litigant, Reginald Ratshosa explains in his letter of complaint against the judge that the matter involves P400 000 that was paid into the trust account of Segopolo & Company, while the judge was practicing as an attorney.
Ratshosa, approached the High Court recently seeking among other things that the Court should declare why Justice Segopolo should not be directed to pay over the P400,000 together with its interest to the Registrar of the Court from the money that was held in his trust account while he was a legal practitioner as per the Order of 22 May 2015; why an order should not be issued declaring that he is not indebted to one Modise Mhlabano in the sum of P400,000 together with interest thereon since such payment was made to Segopolo.
At the time Segopolo, who is currently a High Court judge, was Mhlabano’s legal representative and representing him in a law suit against Ratshosa.
Ratshosa also wants the court to pronounce why an order should not be declared interdicting and restraining Modise from harassing and intimidating him using a writ of execution and deputy sheriffs demanding money which was long paid to him through Justice Segopolo.
He also wants the Court to declare why an order should not be made interdicting and restraining Mhlabano from harassing and intimidating him using the said writ of execution and deputy sheriffs demanding money which was long paid to him through justice Segopolo.
Ratshosa also wants the Court to declare why the conduct of Mhlabano seeking to execute the same writ of execution several times after it has been paid should not be declared as unlawful, fraudulent and an act of harassment.
Giving a background of what led to the current legal dispute, Ratshosa indicated that sometime on the 10th July 2014, Mhlabano instituted an action against him in the sum of P400, 000 with interest of 10% from the date of judgement under case number CVHGB-001825-14.
He explained that as a result of his failure to attend court, Mhlabano obtained judgement in default of his appearance as prayed for in his summons on the 20th April 2016.
“As soon thereafter I learned about the court order, I instructed my attorneys to file an application for rescission and application for staying to set aside the above court order,” said Ratshosa.
He said on the day that the two applications were heard the parties agreed on a draft consent order which was made an order of court on the 22nd May 2015.
“In those applications, I was the Applicant. The court ordered as follows; The Applicant shall cause payment of an amount of P400, 000 together with interest as from September 2014 into the trust account of Segopolo and Company by 1500hours Wednesday 27th 2015 at 3pm,” said Ratshosa. The said court order also directed that the urgent application and the stay of execution application be withdrawn. The court also ordered that, “If the rescission application is granted in favour of the Applicants (Mhlabano), the P400,000.00 paid to Segopolo and Company shall immediately be paid to the Registrar of the High Court.”
Ratshosa indicated that pursuant to the said court order he instructed his attorneys (Mbeha Attorneys) to pay, which they did on the 27th May 2015.
He said a cheque from the trust account of Mbeha Attorneys was received by an employee of Segopolo who was then trading as Segopolo and Company.
“This payment of P400,000.00 was acknowledged by the 2nd Respondent (Segopolo) through a letter dated 2nd June 2015,” said Ratshosa.
In the said letter, Ratshosa said Segopolo indicated that he was to disburse the said funds by the 5th of June 2015 to his client being Mhlabano.
“Through a letter dated 3rd June 2015, my attorney warned the 2nd Respondent (Segopolo) not to release the said amount contrary to the court order. No response was received from the 1st (Mhlabano) and 2nd Respondent (Segopolo),” he said.
According to Ratshosa, the court then granted the rescission application on the 10th October 2019 in his favour.
“This then meant that the amount of P400,000.00 which was paid into the 2nd Respondent (Segopolo) trust account was to be returned to the registrar of the High Court,” he said. He indicated that he instructed his attorneys to communicate with Segopolo to do as per the court order and return the money.
“But my attorney Mr. Mbeha informed me that in the meeting that he had with the 2nd Respondent (Segopolo), the 2nd Respondent indicated that as per his letter of 2nd June 2015 he has already released those funds to his client being the 1st Respondent (Mhlabano),” said Ratshosa.
He said Mbeha then contacted Mhlabano to confront him about this allegation about the money having been disbursed to him.
“The 1st Respondent (Mhlabano) indicated that indeed he has received those funds because we were notified of the disbursements. The 1st Respondent (Mhlabano) indicated that he will write a letter to my attorneys confirming this fact,” said Ratshosa.
Ratshosa said on the 19th of December 2019, Mhlabano delivered a letter in which he indicated that indeed the funds were disbursed to him by him.
“He further indicated that the disbursed funds will be returned to the registrar custody before the next status hearing. I can confirm that the said funds were never deposited with the registrar of the high court despite several demands by myself through my attorneys,” Ratshosa said.
Court records show that as at December 2019, Mhlabano launched an appeal against the judgement in the rescission application.
“By the judgment of 29th April 2022, the court of appeal unfortunately set aside the rescission application and granted judgment to the 1st Respondent (Mhlabano),” said Ratshosa.
He explained that the effect of the Court of Appeal order was that Mhlabano was now entitled to keep the funds that were disbursed to him that he had not yet returned to the registrar.
He pointed out that that sometime on the 15th of June 2021, he launched a complaint against Segopolo to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) complaining about Segopolo’s failure in paying back the money as was required by the court order but he did not receive any response up to date.
Ratshosa said he also wrote another complaint on the same day to the Law Society of Botswana and also did not receive any response from the law society.
“I am not sure if both the Law society and Judicial service commission do not wish to deal with this matter. My last hope is this Honourable court to protect me from the Harassment I get from 1st respondent (Mhlabano) as a result of 2nd respondent (Segopolo)’s failure to pay over the money into court as per the Order of 22 May 2015,” said Ratshosa.
He revealed that to his surprise, on the 13th of June 2022 a certain Deputy Sheriff identified as Ernest Ramodisa appeared at his house armed with a writ of execution, issued by the court on the 6th of May 2015.
“In terms of this writ the sheriff was to raise an amount of P400,000.00 with interest from myself. I informed the Sheriff that this writ has been executed before and was subject to court proceedings on the 22nd May 2015 and further that the said P400,000.00 was given to the 2nd Respondent (Segopolo),” said Ratshosa.
He said the deputy sheriff then contacted Mhlabano about this revelation but Mhlabano still insisted and directed the Deputy Sheriff to proceed with the attachment.
“The deputy sheriff ignored all evidence that was given to him and proceeded to attach and remove my white land cruiser vehicle. He further attached my other household items which he couldn’t remove on that day because they were to come and remove them on another day. But they removed my vehicle,” said Ratshosa.
Ratshosa said the deputy sheriff returned his vehicle only to come back later and produced a letter dated 6th July 2022 from Masire Legal consultants in which they were directed to collect the judgment debt of P400,000.00 together with interest and costs.
“The said letter is attached and marked “MLC”. It is clear from this letter that the said attorneys want to collect untaxed fees. This conduct is unethical to say the least. In the said instructions they were informed to collect a total amount of P779,486.84,” he said.
He said his attorney, Mbeha tried to explain to the deputy sheriff the history of this matter but the deputy sheriff indicated that they are acting on instructions.
“He then spoke to Mr Masire regarding these instructions but Mr Masire indicated that he was also acting on the instruction of his client to collect the debt together with the costs. But no way forward was reached,” said Ratshosa.
