PORT ELIZABETH, January 4 (ANA) – An Eastern Cape attorney who was employed by the Road Accident Fund (RAF) was sentenced in the Motherwell Commercial Crimes Court in Port Elizabeth on Wednesday to three years direct imprisonment or ordered to pay a fine of R100,000 after she defrauded a man by failing to disclose that RAF would pay for his future loss of income following an accident in which he lost his right leg.
The RAF is a statutory body and is obliged to compensate a person (third party) for any loss or damage which the third party has suffered as a result of bodily injury or the death of any bodily injury to any other person caused by the driving of a motor vehicle.
The RAF created a component called Direct Claims in order to help claimants claim directly from the RAF without the use of an attorney. Direct claims have the result that legal costs are avoided and both the claimants and the RAF save money.
To facilitate Direct Claims, the RAF on the Road Show Project and Project Siyenza were created to bring awareness and to provide assistance to the general public.
The purpose of Project Siyenza was to finalise old direct claims and to reduce backlog claims, legal costs and claim processing costs.
According to the State, Julia Mfundisi, who was an employee of the RAF, was appointed as the project coordinator of Project Siyenza in East London. Part of her duties were to help the direct claimants to institute claims, fill in forms, see doctors, and obtain accident reports.
During July 2014, she attended a RAF Road Show in Zwelitsha were she met a RAF claimant, Mncedi Dyosi.
Dyosi who lived in Bedford, was involved in a motor vehicle accident during September 2009 and as a result he lost his right leg. He appointed Zepe Attorneys from Queenstown to lodge a third party claim against the RAF on his behalf, but when he discovered that Zepe Attorneys was charging a contingency fee of 25 percent he ended their mandate.
He then approached the RAF directly and became a self-claimant. Dyosi attended the RAF Road Show during July 2014 in Zwelitsha, were he met Mfundisi.
Mfundisi then visited Dyosi at his home during August 2014. According to the State she falsely told him that the RAF would only help him with compensation for injuries and not with a claim for future loss of income.
She then offered to help him to institute a claim for loss of future income and gave Dyosi documents to sign which he did not read. He realised later that he had unwittingly appointed B. Bangani Attorneys to represent him and had signed a contingency fee agreement of 25 percent in favour of the attorneys.
Following her arrest by the Hawks during 2015, Mfundisi resigned from the RAF and was subsequently reported to the Cape Law Society.
Following the incident she reportedly opened a private practice in Grahamstown.
– African News Agency (ANA)
