Ex-deputy attorney general gets three years

Yassin Choukri, 56, stole almost $500,000 in client funds to feed gambling addiction

A Fredericton lawyer who was disbarred in 2017 for stealing almost $500,000 in client funds entrusted to him has been sentenced to three years in prison for the theft.

Yassin Choukri, 56, of Moncton but formerly of Fredericton, pleaded guilty earlier this year in the Court of King’s Bench in Moncton to an indictable count of theft.

A sentencing hearing was held earlier this month, during which Crown and defence counsel offered a joint recommendation on sentence: three years in prison.

Yassin Choukri (Photo: Borgota Winter Poker Open website)

The parties were back before Justice Robert Dysart at the Moncton Law Courts on Tuesday for his decision on sentence, and he accepted the joint recommendation, finding it was within the establishment range for such offences and appropriate given the circumstances.

Dysart noted that Choukri was a lawyer in private practice until he moved to the public sector as part of the Progressive Conservative government of then-premier Bernard Lord in the early 2000s.

Choukri became deputy justice minister and deputy attorney general, but with a subsequent change in government, he returned to private practice, this time in Fredericton.

However, in the fall of 2016, it was discovered Choukri had abandoned his practice and that client funds held in his trust account were gone.

Amounts deposited in the account between 2014 and 2016 belonging to eight different clients and totalling $481,148 were taken, Dysart said.

The Fredericton Police Force would later charge the offender with eight counts of fraud. The case was headed to trial when Choukri struck a deal with the prosecution to plead guilty to a single count of theft instead.

When two cheques to clients bounced in September 2016, the judge said, Choukri knew he was about to be found out, and he left Fredericton. He was later found in Mississauga, Ont.

Court heard the root cause of Choukri’s criminal acts was a gambling addiction, and money taken from the trust account was mainly used to repay advances he’d received from Casino New Brunswick in Moncton.

“In Ontario, Mr. Choukri enrolled in a program for gambling addicts,” Dysart said. “He finally got his gambling addiction under control.”

Choukri also acknowledged when he was gambling, he was abusing alcohol as well, but he now reports it’s no longer an issue.

The judge noted the offender has no prior criminal history, and he hasn’t worked since he left New Brunswick for Ontario, though he’s receiving a pension. Dysart said Choukri doesn’t have the means to repay the money he stole.

His former clients were compensated for their losses by a program through the Law Society of New Brunswick, court heard, and those payments depleted the organization’s compensation fund.

“As you have acknowledged, your criminal acts have had considerable consequences,” Dysart said in addressing Choukri directly.

“Your conduct was dishonest, it constituted a violation of her professional obligations with regard to your clients and it affected the reputation of your colleagues in the profession of lawyers.”

Choukri, who’d been free on conditions until Tuesday’s sentencing decision, was taken into custody by deputy sheriffs once the judge pronounced the three-year sentence.

Don MacPherson can be contacted at ftonindependent@gmail.com.