MANDEL: Glamourous lawyer couple under suspicion for missing millions

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Published Sep 05, 2024  •  4 minute read

Photos of Toronto lawyers Nicholas Cartel and Singa Bui from their now-defunct website. Photo by Cartel & Bui LLP /cartelbui.com

Anthony Ingarra has one simple question: Where’s the $7 million he and other trusting real estate clients gave the law firm of a glamourous Toronto couple who have since had their licenses temporarily suspended for allegations of fraud?

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Ingarra, a mortgage agent and Oakville firefighter, is among more than 18 who have filed lawsuits against lawyers Nicholas Cartel and Singa Bui and their now-shuttered firm in Liberty Village, alleging they embezzled money they were holding in trust from real estate deals.

“We’re dealing with two people I’ve known close to 10 years. I’ve given them hundreds of referrals. We didn’t see this coming,” says Ingarra, who is suing to recoup more than $400,000 on behalf of himself, his brother and elderly mother. “Singa was my lawyer, she was my go-to. It’s the ultimate betrayal.”

Ontario Superior Court Justice William Chalmers recently found the couple in contempt for not producing key financial records and answering questions about the missing cash. A penalty hearing is scheduled for next month.

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“Where’s the money? We can’t find anything,” Ingarra says.

Meanwhile, he adds, the couple is living in a $5 million, six-bedroom house in Lawrence Park with a Jaguar and a Porsche in the driveway and designer clothes in their closets. “I’ve never seen a more extravagant couple in my life.”

In April, following complaints by the Ingarras and many others, the Law Society Tribunal provisionally suspended the couple’s licences to practise law. According to the ruling, by the time the bank froze the firm’s account in December 2023, there was a shortfall of at least $2.5 million involving two clients who said money was deposited in trust and never paid out.

When clients and their lawyers began hounding them for the cash, the tribunal quoted emails containing a myriad of excuses from Cartel, including problems with the wire transfers and even that his son had been born on March 10, 2023 and was on life support in neonatal intensive care.

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For Ingarra’s family — including $110,000 owed to his retired homemaker mother — it was “excuse after excuse.”

One client who complained to the law society was eventually paid $1.2 million of the $2.4 million he was owed in March 2023 — but only after Cartel took out a private mortgage loan in that specific amount on his two properties and deposited it into the firm’s trust account, the ruling said.

Cartel testified at the tribunal that Bui told him to take out the mortgage to pay for repairs after a sewer pipe explosion in their home.

After that client’s lawyer made good his threat to report them, his remaining $1.2 million was finally transferred.

Cartel didn’t dispute these issues were of “very serious concern,” the ruling said, but his position was that he didn’t know at the time that trust monies “had been misappropriated and/or mishandled.” He pinned the blame on his wife, who was the managing partner with the large real estate practice while he had no involvement in the firm’s finances or day-to-day operations. He concentrated on class-action law, he said.

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Cartel told the tribunal Bui was being hospitalized for an undisclosed mental disorder and he couldn’t ask her any questions about the missing money because she was “extremely ill.”

“He just threw her under the bus, everything is her fault, he has nothing to do with it,” Ingarra says. “How do you not know Nicholas? You’re going out and spending money on your credit card and your debit card every day. Do you not ask your wife, ‘By the way, where is the money coming from?'”

The tribunal was equally skeptical.

“This is a two-partner firm in which the evidence before us shows misappropriation of trust funds. While it is conceivable that Ms. Bui acted alone and that Mr. Cartel had no knowledge or involvement, there are good reasons to believe otherwise,” the tribunal wrote in provisionally suspending his licence in April.  “Mr. Cartel’s integrity as a lawyer is in doubt.”

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Cartel is appealing his suspension.

Asked to comment on the allegations, he sent a lengthy email to the Sun: “First and foremost, I wish to express my deepest concern and empathy for all affected parties, understanding the difficulties and distress these events have caused. Their trust and well-being are of paramount importance,” he began. “I am dedicated to making all affected parties whole again, and have already resolved some of the transactions to completion.”

Cartel went on to insist he’s providing large tranches of documents to the court “in good faith” to purge his contempt finding and as for his wife, she’s dealing with “severe and debilitating personal health challenges for more than a year, and protracted hospitalization for a number of health issues, including multiple miscarriages and related mental health issues.”

Ingarra doesn’t believe a word. He’s furious with the couple — but also with the Law Society for not shutting them down sooner and Toronto Police for what seems like a lacklustre criminal investigation.

“This is a very broken system,” he laments. “It’s very unfair for a lot of unfortunate good, hardworking people.”

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