A High Court judge has said it was ‘surprising and disheartening’ to see the involvement of an English-qualified solicitor in laying a misleading paper trail for a sports betting company.
Mrs Justice Dias was ruling in Abudantia v Fastron, concerning a Turkish gambling company Abudantia which had entered into a profit-sharing arrangement with Fastron, part of the international online sports betting brand, Parimatch.
Parimatch approached Abudantia for its knowledge of the Turkish market, which has an unpredictable and aggressive regulatory regime.
Abudantia launched a gambling website using the Parimatch trade mark, but by the end of 2021 Fastron was disasstisfied with its performance and tried to terminate the joint venture. Abudantia unsuccessfully sought a declaration in the High Court that the joint venture remained in force so it could continue using the Parimatch trade mark.
During the course of the litigation, Mrs Justice Dias made a finding that Parimatch had ‘developed a brand protection strategy’ when operating in the Turkish market. Parimatch was laying a ‘paper trail to be deployed in the event that awkward questions were asked about its involvement in the Turkish market, so that it could plausibly claim, falsely, that any dubious activity was entirely without its authority or knowledge’, the judge found.
She concluded that English-qualified solicitor Zuleyha Tohtayeva, who acted as legal counsel for PMI and Fastron - and has also founded her own law firm in London, SteelRose - was involved in this strategy.
‘I had serious reservations about her role in relation to the brand protection strategy’, Mrs Justice Dias said. ‘This was plainly a misleading position and wholly disingenuous on the part of Parimatch. ‘I do not accept that Ms Tohtayeva was simply following instructions. On the contrary, it is clear that she took a proactive role at some points.'
The judge continued: ‘It is surprising and disheartening (to say the least) that an English solicitor should have been a willing party to such a strategy, and it is perhaps fortunate that in the event it never became necessary to deploy this “evidence” vis-à-vis third party banks or regulators. Had that happened, the inescapable conclusion is that Parimatch would have been dishonestly attempting to mislead those third parties with commensurately serious consequences.'
The judge stressed that Tohtayeva herself was not on trial. However she said: 'I wish to make it quite clear that the court does not and will not condone such behaviour which it regards as a serious breach of professional ethics.’
Tohtayeva has been approached for comment.
