Richmond real estate lawyer Hong Guo says she is making efforts to pay back clients who are facing major losses after $7.5 million disappeared from her legal trust.

Postmedia has reported a number of Chinese investors and B.C. real estate professionals are suing Guo, alleging $2.1 million in losses, after Guo says more than $7.5 million was stolen from her trust account in early 2016.

article continues below

According to legal filings, at least five property transactions were affected in Guo’s trust-fund shortfall. The Chinese investor cases involve $1.38 million in “holdback funds” that investors allege Guo retained in trust to pay her clients’ tax bills on Canadian real estate transactions.

Guo has advised Postmedia that she put her own money into deals affected by the trust-fund shortfall, and that no deals fell through.

“The real estate transactions were not disrupted, all the transactions closed,” Guo added in an interview Monday. “And I’m making all the efforts to pay off the liabilities. Even though the insurance doesn’t cover (losses) and the amount is quite large, I have the ability to pay it off. But it takes time.”

Guo says that her law firm completes about $700 million in real estate transactions a year, and she owns enough assets to pay back anyone claiming losses against her and her firm in this case. She said that she is in the process of selling three personal investments including a B.C. home, a farm in Saskatchewan and a $15.8 million investment property to raise cash.

“I am able to pay. I’m selling my assets, but it takes time,” Guo said. “I paid a few million already.”

“If my business shuts down, it really doesn’t help anybody,” Guo added. “I have 20 people (working for the law firm), I need to support them. I have two children, I need to support them.”

In a B.C. Supreme Court civil suit, Guo has accused two former employees of conspiring to steal over $7.5 million from her trust account with forged cheques, before laundering funds in a B.C. casino, and ultimately sending cash to China. In legal filings, Guo says she personally pursued the alleged suspects to China and questioned her former employees.

Guo alleged the Zhuhai police are detaining her former employees but have not yet charged them.

For more stories, go to vancouversun.com