A man who is alleged to be a fake lawyer successfully won 26 cases in court before he was found out. The man, Brian Mwenda Njagi, allegedly impersonated an actual lawyer who has a similar name.
According to the professional body, the Law Society of Kenya, the real lawyer who was being impersonated is named Brian Mwenda Ntwiga.
Alleged fake lawyer represents clients in court and wins cases
The real lawyer, Brian Mwenda Ntwiga, was admitted to the professional body but was yet to get his practising certificate.
The alleged fake lawyer, Brian Mwenda Njagi, reportedly gained illegal access to the law society’s portal and applied for the practising certificate using the real lawyer’s profile.
The law society says as quoted by Citizen Digital: “On the 5th Day of August, 2022, Brian Mwenda Ntwiga was admitted to the bar and his correct email address was captured and an account opened for him in the Advocates portal.
“We reached out to advocate Brian Mwenda Ntwiga, who confirmed that he had not applied for a practising certificate since his admission, the reason being that he had been working at the Office of the Attorney General and did not require a Practising Certificate.
“It was only until sometime in September 2023 when he attempted to login into the system and activate his profile with the intention of applying for his Practising Certificate, that he realized he could not access his LSK portal.”
Brian Mwenda Njagi allegedly impersonated an actual lawyer
Upon investigation, it was found that the alleged fake lawyer, Brian Mwenda Njagi changed the real lawyer’s profile picture and put his own on the legal body’s portal.
The statement continued:
“The preliminary findings indicate that the masquerader applied the use of a common international fraud scheme known as Business Email Compromise (BEC) where a criminal in this case Brian Mwenda identified a genuine advocate status as being inactive, made contact to the secretariat to make an application for payment of his PC but which he couldn’t because his email credentials are incorrect.
“Upon being allowed access to the account, he took control of the portal and changed his profile picture, the workplace and applied and paid for the practicing certificate. However, his application was not processed since he was required to provide documents including the certificate of business incorporation.”
The law society has called for the arrest of Brian Mwenda Njagi. The story has gone viral, and it was shared on X by Naira PR, and it got many reactions.
Kenyan authorities arrest fake lawyer, Brian Mwenda, who has falsely been presenting himself as an Advocate of Kenya high court, having argued 26 cases before High Court Judges, Magistrates, and Court of Appeal Judges and won all the 26 cases
Can he make it 27 out of 27 if he… pic.twitter.com/8VtR7QE01X
— Naija (@Naija_PR) October 13, 2023
