Lee Suet Fern and a Will.

Disbar Lee Suet Fern? Isn’t that using a tomahawk blade to mow a lawn?

This is a serious sanction. 37 years of practice, and for one infraction, you may be struck off. Law Society is actually asking for that for her handling of her late father-in-law’s seventh and last will. 

I guess it had never crossed the mind of LKY that his testamentary wishes from the grave would have brought so much distress (legal and emotional) to his family, that is, the ones he (and his wife) had been protecting over their lifetime. 

I guess it all comes down to this: Is LKY of sound mind in 2013 when he executed his last and final will? 

Prof Woon said that to characterise LKY at that time to be a “doddering old dotard” and “being taken advantage of by his son and daughter-in-law” is unfounded. There is just no conclusive medical proof of that, and no DSM category for that too. What does “a doddering old dotard” even mean from a legal standpoint, and in relation to his mental capacity to sign his own will? 

Short of a full trial, examining evidence and witnesses, none is the wiser when it comes to judging whether he had signed his will under mental incapacity or duress, or he didn’t comprehend what he was signing. 

Anyway, that ship has sailed for now since no one has come forward to contest the last will. And here is what was reported. 

“Noting that the will’s validity has not been contested by the executors or beneficiaries, CJ Menon said: “The only question before us pertains to whether (Mrs Lee) was in a solicitor-client relationship, and if she was, whether she discharged her duties, and if she wasn’t, whether there was some other aspect of her conduct that was unacceptable.”

So, in her defence, Prof Woon said that as LKY’s daughter-in-law, how could she have even asked him to get independent advice considering his formidable intellectual capacity at that time. 

Prof Woon said: “(LKY) would have exploded. The sound of the explosion would have been heard all the way to the Istana.” he said. “Mr Lee Kuan Yew, a "brilliant lawyer" himself, could not have been taken advantage of.”

Lesson? Just one. 

Well, to borrow that expression, the sound of explosion had in my view gone to Parliament once for this case of sibling rivalry. That explosion then reverberated over social media for years to come, in the courts for a contempt proceedings, during the recent GE 2020 when LHY dropped a bombshell, and it is now heard just as loud in the court of three judges on a disciplinary matter, with LSF being liable to be struck off. 

Many things have been said about this case, and many more will be said, for it is a family drama that has played out in the public view of not just Singaporeans, but the world at large. 

It started with a “demolition”, so to speak, and I guess that is aptly, if not ironically, symbolic of how the saga has unfolded, that is, it has been a legal and political minefield that kept triggering off every now and then.

 

Alas, the timing of the sibling rivalry and all that has happened between them, especially the family of LHY, is most unfortunate, and deeply uncanny. 

Senior Counsel Kenneth Tan made this pointed observation regarding LSF’s role as first a kin rather than a lawyer to LKY, arguing that her role is purely administrative since LKY had already made up his mind about changing the will.

He said: “Before you’re a lawyer, you’re a son or daughter. The rules are not that of this court or any court. Love, affection and familial relationships have got nothing to do with these cold courts and they should not be scrutinised here.”

True, “love, affection and familial relationships have got nothing to do with these cold courts”, but at times, hell has no fury like a family member scorned, spurned and/or sidelined. 

I guess by now, it would be most familiar to us that the intensity of emotions, whether positive or negative, corresponds directly in proportion to the closeness (or familiarity) of the relationship. That is, the closer they are, the more explosive a dispute will be. 

Just as lovers locked in a wedding vows are prepared to donate an organ to another without condition, when it comes to a separation or divorce, you can expect the acrimony between parties to wish another the worse of personal fortunes. 

So, it is sadly the case here with this saga. It has torn the family apart, caused one family to stay out of their birth country, and possibly risks a disbarment over what the defence has described as fundamentally an expression of “love, affection and familial relationships”. 

But then, that is precisely what exacerbates (and perpetuates) the acrimony, and turns siblings into enemies, friends into foes and lovers into adversaries.

 

Lee Saga - Lee Suet Fern Part 2.

This, I guess, is a two parter. I wrote about it yesterday, and today, the ST wrote another piece about it, which kept me thinking further. 

In sum, if you need a caption for it, you can borrow what the Disciplinary Tribunal (DT) calls the whole saga, “an unsavoury tale”.

Well, unsavoury or otherwise, Lee Suet Fern (LSF) has come forward to defend herself. She said: “I disagree with the disciplinary tribunal’s report and will fight this strongly when it is heard in open court.”

She urged the public to “look at the entire record of the closed-door proceedings and come to their own independent conclusions.”

If you read the papers today, and the day before, you will note that it is largely a rehashing of the DT’s findings. That is, in the 206-page report, LSF was described as a “deceitful witness, who tailored her evidence to portray herself as an innocent victim who had been maligned.”

Words/phrases used in both days of reporting were “facade”, “she lied”, her husband was “equally deceitful”, how they “misled” LKY on his last will, “cut off (LKY’s) lawyer”, “gave the briefest advice to Mr Lee” and “did not alert Mr Lee to all the differences between what Mr Lee had earlier wanted and what the last will actually provided.”

Although the title of the piece is “Lee Suet Fern rejects tribunal’s ruling against her,” the above quotes of LSF and her gratitude expressed to her stellar legal team (led by Walter Woon) just about sums up her side, save for reading the entire records and going to her husband’s FB post for more. 

However, I write today because there is another piece of the puzzle to the whole thing and I feel that it somehow spiced up the “unsavoury tale”. It is about what Dr Lee Wei Ling has to say. 

She called “the tribunal report a “travesty”, adding that it was an attempt to “rewrite history””. And she added: “My father knew full well what he was doing. He was clear in his decision for the will.”

He knew full well? He was clear in his decision? 

Note that Dr Lee is a neurologist and she ought to be able to tell who’s sound and who’s not. What’s more, I trust she knows her father better than anyone and she was by his side at all crucial times. She is not just trained expertly, but the “patient” she was tending to was her own father.

My point is, if what she said is true and can be objectively and medically proven on a balance of probability, that would add to the whole unsavoury tale a jarring twist to the heart of the plot. 

Why? Because, if LKY knew what he was doing, if he took cognizance of the identity of the drafter of his last will, agreeing to her being the drafter, notwithstanding the conflict of interest, thereby waiving it, then LSF may not be that “deceitful” afterall. 

Neither would LHY be “equally deceitful” to hurry the execution of the will, save for some inaccuracies posted. 

What I mean is that the preparation of the last will, the bypassing of Kwa and the hurrying to sign it by leaving it with LKY the night before and executing it the next morning, when seen in the entire context of a mentally sound, physically uncompromised and largely able and willing testator, save for duress, one then ought to be more reserved, cautious and circumspect when shifting through the evidence in the finding of facts. 

And since DT makes no mention of LKY’s mental state at the material time, but merely remarked (as published) that LKY was in “frail health”, which says little about his mental state and appears to be inconsistent with Dr Lee’s view, I feel that the key piece of the “unsavoury tale” puzzle is still missing. 

Indeed, that mental state of affair is even more unsavoury (in my view). 

As for duress, or undue pressure, well, currently, I am still looking for that smoking gun called motive (read my yesterday’s post). 

And I wonder, is the last will done in stealth, kept from PM Lee’s knowledge? Because, LKY had 15 months after executing it to change his mind, secretly call Kwa to amend it (making it the 8th will), or Kwa could have intervened (discuss with LKY, inform PM Lee) after having sight of the 7th will, or inform someone he trusts about it. 

And unless he is too frail to do anything after he signed the 7th will, or the mental deterioration had reached a point of no return, I feel that the case for it before the DT needs more evidential digging - hopefully the court of three judges can clear the air here. 

So, after all said, I wonder whether the DT only picked up the conflict, the hurrying and the bypassing (of Kwa), (and the FB deflection), to base their view that the couple is deceitful, thereby misleading their father (or FIL), or they have something more than that to arrive at that finding. 

If there is nothing more, then, wouldn’t it be like seeing a much older man tightly hugging a teenage girl and kissing her on the cheeks, and immediately describing the sight as disgusting, only to realise, after some enquiry, that they are actually father and daughter, and he is sending her off for overseas studies, and won’t be seeing her for the next few years. 

Ps: Just an analogy, don’t read too much into it. Cheerz.