Admission to Bar denied to man who plagiarised twice at SMU

The 47-year-old’s character flaws warrant a dismissal of his application: Chief Justice

- Selina Lum

A 47-year-old aspiring lawyer, who committed plagiarism twice in 2019 while studying for a juris doctor law degree at the Singapore Management University (SMU), has been refused admission to the Bar.

Mr Gabriel Silas Tang Rafferty cannot submit a fresh application to be admitted as a lawyer in Singapore for at least five years.

Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon said Mr Rafferty's character defects were so "dire" that a dismissal of his admission application was called for, to signal the urgent need for reform.

The case is the latest in a series of applications for Bar admission that have come before the Chief Justice in recent years, in which an applicant's fitness of character has been called into question.

Mr Rafferty is the first to have his application dismissed.

In a judgment on March 22, Chief Justice Menon said Mr Rafferty was an applicant who did not acknowledge the full extent of his wrongdoing, did not appreciate his duty of candour, and who had tried to mislead the court and the stakeholders in his application for admission.

In other cases where the Chief Justice judged that the applicants were not yet fit and proper to be called to the Bar, he had allowed them to withdraw their admission applications.

While the practical effect of these two options may be similar, the signalling of each is fundamentally different, said the Chief Justice.