The lawyer who once won a CBC contest proclaiming him “Canada’s smartest person” has handed in his licence to the Law Society of BC after admitting he misappropriated about $10,000 from five accounts belonging to clients or his firm, between January and August 2021.
“Former Vancouver lawyer Braden William Lauer has terminated his membership with the law society and agreed not to practice law for 10 years after admitting professional misconduct,” the society stated April 17.
Lauer agreed not to apply for re-instatement to the society or elsewhere within Canada for 9.5 years starting this month.
Lauer was working as an independent contractor with a firm but “with little or no mentorship or supervision,” according to his undertaking. A LinkedIn profile indicates he worked at one point with or for Gowling WLG.
Lauer admitted to 11 allegations of misconduct, showed remorse and indicated he had health problems at the time of the misconduct. He had only been practicing law for 34 months.
In 2014, Lauer gained national attention when he won CBC’s Canada’s Smartest Person game show.
“The CBC show challenges assumptions about what it means to be smart. Rather than compare IQs, contestants tackle a series of tests that measure six types of intelligence: musical, physical, social, logical, visual, and linguistic,” CBC reported Nov. 24, 2014.
