2023-11-27 Moya not disputing incorrect information provided by Ceballos

From Road Traffic Injury

I am sending additional information for complaint CAS014655 about solicitor Moya de Luca-Leonard failing to dispute incorrect information provided by QBE insurance solicitor Mr Ceballos related to my personal injury claim despite obvious errors in Mr Ceballos statements and my instructions.

At that time I did not imagine how negatively Moya de Luca-Leonard actions may affect my claim. It felt wrong that the reply prepared by Ms Leonard and Ms Campbell is vaguely written and does not dispute the obviously incorrect statements provided by QBE solicitor Mr Ceballos in a clear manner. However, I am not a solicitor and I have no experience dealing with insurance, so when Ms Leonard previously argued that she is a solicitor with many years of experience and the law requires to do the way she does I could not argue. I did believe that she will include all this information in some way, possibly in attachments together with evidence I provided. I was wrong. She simply withheld important information.

I do believe that Ms Leonard's actions qualify as negligence as misrepresentation or even more serious misconduct.

Summary

Mr Ceballos, QBE solicitor, submitted an application for panel review of medical assessment. Application was based on many factually incorrect statements. I provided Ms Leonard, my solicitor, with a detailed list highlighting where are errors in Mr Ceballos statements and supporting evidence. Unfortunately, despite my input Ms Leonard replied with a submission that did not show any errors in Mr Ceballos statements. Even worse, In some cases the reply submission even agrees with incorrect statements. This gave ground for panel review, caused delays, additional stress and negatively affected final decision.

Background

I got injured on 2015-03-30 when I got hit by a car while cycling. QBE insurer for the driver Michael Gill admitted liability. I have ongoing insurance claim with QBE. On 2020-06-06 Moya de Luca-Leonard started representing me as I was unhappy with previous solicitors from Law Partners. Dr Wayne Mason Personal Injury Commission medical assessor issued a certificate with 19% whole person impairment due to road traffic injury on 2021-03-17 (see "2021-03-17 Dr Wayne Mason assessment.pdf").

Timeline

  1. 2021-04-14 Mr Ceballos wrote to Ms Leonard and PIC appealing independent medical assessment (see "2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf" and "2021-04-14 - Letter to c sols serving PIC Application - appeal to assessment.pdf")
  2. 2021-04-15 Ms Leonard informed me about appeal (see "2021-04-15 email from Moya canceling meeting with Campbell.pdf")
  3. 2021-04-15 I wrote back to Ms Leonard informing that "there are a lot of statements by Ceballos that are not true" and "these statements make me very sick and I have to say that they are not true". I included an example "For example Ceballos states: "The claimant obtained project work with the Lithuanian Community, which likely requires collaboration, meetings and dealings with his client;". However, it is not true. I did not get this project. I attempted to work on my own on it and failed with no result. See "2021-04-15 email to Moya - writing that Ceballos appeal has many errors.pdf".
  4. 2021-04-19 I sent to Ms Leonard information about my job search just before the injury with evidence provided by the recruiter that we discussed working at a particular position in the company she was requiting for. I attached more info about job search and records of meetups I attended at that time. It can be provided if needed, but I skipped it here thinking that it is too many details. See "2021-04-21 email to Moya - Re Job search before injury.pdf".
  5. 2021-04-20 11:26 Ms Leonard sent me an email asking to highlight all incorrect statements by the insurer. See "2021-04-20 Stonis letter client email 23.pdf" and "2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf". Ms Leonard wrote "The correction of the insurer's errors or wrongs, in the review application, is most important".
  6. 2021-04-20 11:32 Ms Leonard replied asking to insert a date in LinkedIn info. See "2021-04-21 email to Moya - Re Job search before injury.pdf".
  7. 2021-04-21 I sent to Ms Leonard another screen shot from LinkedIn with the conversation date visible. See "2021-04-21 email to Moya - Re Job search before injury.pdf" and "2019-04-24 - Masodah Meeting Confirmation LinkedIn.pdf".
  8. 2021-04-26 2:18 I sent Ms Leonard a list of incorrect statements by Mr Ceballos part 1. I worked very hard since I got appeal information to provide that list on time as requested by Ms Leonard. I did not manage to send it in on Sunday, but sent it early on Monday night, so that when Ms Leonard starts work she will have it. See "2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf" and "2021-04-26 appealCommentsPart1.pdf". I wrote to Ms Leonard highlighting that Ceballos appeal is based on incorrect information (misquoted referenced documents to completely change meaning). An example: in my statement I wrote: "65. I had a similar demoralising experience back in 2016 in relation to a small job for a Swedish firm which my brother put me in touch with. That is something that should have taken a week or even less and which I was unable to complete within 6 weeks." Ceballos wrote: "The claimant obtained a role in Sweden in 2016, allegedly working for a period of 6 weeks – paragraph 65 of his statement dated 29 April 2019".
  9. 2021-04-26 19:32 I wrote to Ms Leonard providing a long list of incorrect statements by Ceballos: 11 pages, 50 notes, mostly correcting incorrect quotes or additions by Mr Ceballos that were not in the original text. See "2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf" and "2021-04-26 appealCommentsPart.pdf". The evidence I provided proved that Mr Ceballos' appeal was completely factually incorrect.
  10. 2021-04-26 23:50 I sent another email with evidence supporting the previous email that Mr Ceballos' appeal is based on factually incorrect statements. See "2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf".
  11. 2021-04-29 I wrote to Ms Leonard asking what the status of reply to appeal is and is there anything else I can do.
  12. 2021-04-30 Ms Leonard replied that there is no work for me at this stage and reply is being prepared.
  13. 2021-05-04 Ms Leonard sent me Campbell reply submissions written on 2021-04-29. It took Ms Leonard 6 days to forward the document. She wrote that she is going to file it the next day and I can ask her if I have any questions. See "2021-05-04 email from Moya - submissions Campbell reply to QBE appeal.pdf" and "2021-05-04 lr client email 24 plus submissions - Campbell reply to QBE appeal.pdf". Campbell's submission does not dispute any incorrect statements by Ceballos. She only writes how the assessor addressed them. However, it is inaccurate, Mr Ceballos statements are factually incorrect and could not be part of the assessment.
  14. 2021-05-04 I have replied to Ms Leonard that it causes me to panic when I need to read anything related to the injury; I need more time; All I can do at this time is to provide as accurate information as I can to her and that she presents it to the Personal Injury Commission. I have provided all this information to her. I just mentioned in email again that what Mr Ceballos wrote is incorrect: there was no employment contract in 2019, there was only voluntary work about petitions that I failed. I could not comment about how to write an appeal reply (I have no experience and my cognitive abilities were severely limited at that time). The reply mentioned that I do not agree with Mr Ceballos statements, so I thought she will add all documents I have sent her as attachments. I knew that the next day was the deadline, so I asked to send it. I also attached the document about petitions. See "2021-05-05 email from Moya - she will send a reply to appeal and believes that appeal has no material basis.pdf" and "Petitions for election 2019 post in Sydney.pdf".
  15. 2021-05-05 Ms Leonard wrote that she will file the reply today and believe that the appeal has no material basis. See "2021-05-05 email from Moya - she will send a reply to appeal and believes that appeal has no material basis.pdf".
  16. There has been more communication with PIC, but appeal was granted and review for assessment was assigned.
  17. Ms Leonard in her bill claims to spend 44 h 24 min (and secretary 13 h 30 min) working on documents related to my claim in her bill till 2021-05-05 and "in April including between 14 and 16 April, reading the decision by the assessor, the appeal against it, your instructions, advice from counsel and provision of instructions to counsel such as to obtain reply submissions collating them, for 29 April, 22 units and 180 minutes". See "2022-11-07 Tax Invoice 11841.pdf" provided earlier. This is the time she claims to have spent learning about the claim with the main part (and the only one application to PIC) being this assessment and appeal to it for total legal fees of $40,771.50.

My Complaint

Ms Leonard failed to provide the Personal Injury Commission (PIC) with important information (a dispute that information provided by Mr Ceballos, QBE insurance solicitor, is factually incorrect) that negatively affected my personal injury claim:

  • appeal against medical assessors decision has been granted resulting in more than a year delay and additional review process
  • because incorrect statements were not disputed the review panel took it into consideration and part of the decision was affected resulting in significantly reducing chances of getting compensation for loss of income.

Ms Leonard's actions were at least negligence and professional misconduct, but likely even worse. She knew about the importance of the information provided to her (wrote about it herself) and then failed to forward any of the provided information to PIC.

  1. 2021-03-17 I got very accurate assessment that confirmed the treating doctors' diagnosis that I have PTSD that is significantly affecting my life, 19% whole person impairment. In section Apportionment he noted "There is no evidence that Mr Stonis was symptomatic at the time of the subject motor accident. He denied any subsequent injuries or conditions. There is no requirement for apportionment".
  2. 2021-04-14 Mr Ceballos appealed assessment based on factually incorrect statements. I wrote 50 different corrections for that appeal. For example:
    • Simply writing that something has not been looked at by assessor, when it it is clearly mentioned;
    • Mr Ceballos wrote that I obtained employment several times after the injury misquoting text from documents. For example Mr Ceballos wrote "The claimant obtained a role in Sweden in 2016, allegedly working for a period of 6 weeks – paragraph 65 of his statement dated 29 April 2019;". While I have not been able to work at all and have not been in Sweden in 2016. My statement was about a "demoralising experience" while trying to help my brother with a small project where I failed even with something trivial like setting a working environment.
    • There were many other factually incorrect statements by Mr Ceballos, some of them best described as pure and incorrect speculations.
  3. I wrote to Ms Leonard that it is very important to me to correct incorrect statements by Mr Ceballos. Ms Leonard was well aware of the importance of highlighting errors and wrongs in Mr Ceballos statement as she wrote herself.
  4. I sent her a full list of incorrect statements with supporting evidence. We did all the work for Ms Leonard. All that was left to do for Ms Leonard was to pass it to PIC. I was under the impression that she would do this.
  5. Ms Leonard made it so that I could not review or edit submissions. Ms Leonard had prepared submissions on 2021-04-29, but waited till 2021-05-04 to send it to me. She sent it with instructions that it will be filed the next day. In my condition it gave me no chance to read it and make any edits within the one day deadline. Ms Leonard put me in a position where my attempts to understand what is being written or find out how it could be updated would mean that we will miss the deadline. If she had forwarded this document earlier and explained that this is the only thing that will be submitted there is a good chance that I would be able to insist on correcting it.
  6. Ms Leonard was aware how I function and that anything related to injury has a severe effect on me causing panic attacks and not being able to think at all. Ms Leonard advertised that she specializes in clients with PTSD and has a diploma in psychology (email signature: “Grad Dip Clsg/Psychotherapy”).
  7. The submissions provided by Ms Leonard and Ms Campbell did not address any incorrect statements by Mr Ceballos, but assumed that they were correct. Instead they try to show that the assessor addressed all these factually incorrect statements. But it is not possible. For example, how can an assessor consider my work in Sweden if I have not been in Sweden, have not worked there, and never told anything like that to the assessor, because it is not true. It was created by Mr Ceballos while writing an appeal.
  8. In some cases reply submission even partially or fully agree with incorrect statements. This gives the impression that the application for review may have some grounds. For example: Item 12. "... Further, it is not uncommon for there to be slight inconsistencies in histories provided by a claimant given the passage of time. ...". However, there were no inconsistencies, but reply submissions give the impression that there are inconsistencies in medical records. The inconsistencies were only Mr Ceballos' application. I was working on my own application and just before the injury I started looking for employment, while still working on my project. This is documented in my statement and mentioned in many medical history records. Mr Ceballos took one bit of story from one medical record, like from Mr Sutton notes he took "to continue look for work - which he was doing at the time of the accident", but left out "Discussed how he was updating his IT knowledge and working on a start-up product at the time of accident". Then Mr Ceballos states that Mr Sutton recorded that I was only looking for work, but not working on my own project and it conflicts with other medical records. The problem is that my solicitor and barrister this way validated incorrect statements by Mr Ceballos. If Ms Leonard or Ms Campbell opened my comments about the application or any documents referenced in it or my at least my statement they would see that Mr Ceballos statements were incorrect. See full list of validation of incorrect statements at Analysis of 2021-04-29 reply submissions.
  9. I can not understand why Ms Leonard withheld crucial information and did not forward it to PIC. She had that information, knew that it was important and arranged things so that I had no chance to intervene. I struggle to explain using negligence as it is just too much. It feels like she deliberately withheld important information for appeal to succeed and to avoid showing that Mr Ceballos deliberately provided incorrect information.
  10. Ms Leonard has not included other information that was important in dismissing the appeal, but was provided to her at earlier stages. Unfortunately due to high stress and I was not able to point these things out in my response to appeal. However, I have mentioned it to Ms Leonard during the whole process a few times and she claims to be spending 44 h 24 min (and secretary 13 h 30 min) working on documents related to my claim in her bill till 2021-05-05. See 2023-11-26 Analysis of Moya bill - Moya de Luca-Leonard time spent before appeal rep.pdf. Examples follow.
  11. Mr Ceballos wrote that the assessor failed to consider “The prior psychological histories contained in the clinical notes of Mr Steve Sutton, treating psychologist, and Argyle Street Medical Centre;”. In reply I provided the following information to Ms Leonard “I do believe that my mental history was properly included. Assessor even included the review of Mr Steve Sutton report section 6 subsection A3 page 7. I have visited Argyle Street Medical Centre only to get the referral to see Mr Sutton - I think it was 2 visits.”. I forgot to mention that time, but Ms Leonard was aware of the fact that I have seen Mr Sutton main in 2011 and 2014. At the beginning of 2014 I had seen Mr Sutton only 3 times and I was feeling fine and we decided that I do not even need to use the available sessions (I had 6 sessions, with option for another 4). The last notes were “Reports he is feeling a lot better and more focused and motivated to do some work and look for more work”. See 2011-12-19 Report by Stephen Sutton and Clinical Notes of Stephen Sutton.pdf page 8, date 2014-02-03. After this the next doctor visit was on 2015-01-19 with no complaints about mental health. See 2015-01-19 Dr Susana Tjandra notes.pdf. Assessor considered medical records and they show different information that Mr Ceballos tries to present. There are many more cases like this.
  12. If any of this information would have been provided the appeal almost certainly would have been dismissed and if possible some action taken against Mr Ceballos for providing incorrect statements.
  13. This caused an appeal to be accepted, a review of assessment appointed and extended my medical assessment dispute till 2022-09-30 when the review panel issued a new determination.
  14. Ms Leonard withheld important information to dispute incorrect statements provided by Mr Ceballos directly together with a report, from a psychologist hired by Mr Ceballos, with even more absurdly incorrect statements (for example my girlfriend was bringing meals for me daily from Europe, while I was in Australia) affecting the new determination. As a result a new opinion was added that I had some impairment before the injury. The only basis for this is that I see these factually incorrect statements.
  15. Before the injury I was a highly skilled software developer with 20 years experience and PhD in computer science and realistically after 8 years by now I would be earning $200,000 per year. But as a result of Ms Leonard negligence I could expect to get only a buffer payment of $100,000 for loss of 8 years of income and the same for future income.
  16. This also caused me almost a year and half delay, lots of pain and suffering, stress and damage to my health. It also added additional work and expenses.

Further information

I am not familiar with the OLSC complaint process. I focus on one particular aspect of Ms Leonard's actions: not providing essential information to PIC in reply to appeal by QBE insurance. It caused delays, a lot of stress and suffering and damaged my claim. If needed I can provide further information about it.

It is very difficult to overstate or imagine how debilitating PTSD is. I did my best to provide correct information, but in the end I was dependent on Ms Leonard to do her work and she did not even forward the information I have provided. I can provide further information on how PTSD limited my abilities.

Attachments

  1. 2021-03-17 Dr Wayne Mason assessment.pdf
  2. 2021-04-14 - Letter to c sols serving PIC Application - appeal to assessment.pdf
  3. 2021-04-20-30 emails from-to Moya Ceballos appeal and my comments with evidence of errors.pdf
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