A hearing panel of the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC) has found that a former rep with Dundee Securities Corp., misled clients and his firm with false and forged documents in several instances, and that he misappropriated client funds in excess of $200,000.

The panel also found that despite several notices to appear, Patrick David O’Neill failed to meet with IIROC staff and co-operate with an IIROC investigation.

The violations took place when O’Neill was a registered representative at the Pointe-Claire, Que. branch of Dundee Securities.

IIROC began its formal investigation into O’Neill’s conduct on April 6, 2009, after the firm terminated him and reported numerous client complaints to IIROC.

Specifically, the panel found that O’Neill engaged in conduct unbecoming and detrimental to the public interest, by:

> delivering a false document to a client to make her believe that a transaction had been cancelled as per her instructions;
> falsely allowing the same client on two separate occasions to believe that she had received compensation from her investment dealer, even though the cheques had come from her own cash account;
> misleading another client by sending him forged statements that did not accurately reflect his portfolios;
> forging or using change of address documents with falsified copied signatures to redirect that same client’s mail away from his residential address;
> sending the firm’s compliance department a letter with the forged signature of that same client;
> making a client believe that he was receiving a monthly rental income, although the funds came from the client’s own margin account with the firm; and
> proposing a fictitious and unauthorized off-book investment to a client to obtain $200,000 of the client’s money.

The panel also found that O’Neill failed to co-operate in the IIROC investigation by failing to meet requests to appear and to provide information.

In its decision, the panel stated, “the evidence before us is abundantly clear, cogent, convincing, and damning against [Mr. O’Neill]. He is clearly dishonest, a liar, a forger and a perpetrator of fraud. …”

The panel announced its findings in a decision dated November 11. The panel will meet at a future date to determine the appropriate penalty.

O’Neill is not currently registered with an IIROC-regulated firm.

IE