Lawyer who had a ‘fixation’ with Nazi Germany and kept a replica samurai sword in his office faces a £220,000 court bill after being sued by his work partner for misusing over £100,000 of the company’s money.

A senior solicitor who was obsessed with Nazis and kept a replica samurai sword in his office has been hit with a £220,000 court bill after being sued for misusing more than £100,000 of the firm’s money .

“Strange and deceitful” lawyer Domenico Pisano has been ordered to repay £109,000 to London firm Dominic Levent Solicitors – where he was a partner – after allegedly transferring £95,000 of the firm’s money to his own account and spending a further £14,000 on goods. for “its use”.

The Nazi Germany-obsessed barrister, who lives in New Barnet, also faces a further £110,000 legal costs bill after his former work partner Levent Hasan – through Dominic Levent Solicitors Ltd – took him in court for the misused funds.

Central London Crown Court heard that Mr Pisano, 57, who resigned in April 2022 after he and Mr Hasan fell out, had exhibited “bizarre” behavior in the office and engaged in on-site bullying of work, including hitting an intern.

Judge Simon Monty KC found the allegation that Mr Pisano took “£95,000 of the company’s assets, both before and after his resignation as a director, and refused to return the money” and that he “spent additional sums for a variety of expensive electronic products and other goods for personal use without any benefit to the company”.

The judge ordered Mr Pisano to repay the £95,000 he transferred, plus £13,986.06 to cover the cost of the goods he bought.

He also ordered a costs payment of £111,180 – 80% of a total cost bill of £138,975, while calling Mr Pisano “a strange and deluded individual with a poor understanding of reality”.

Giving evidence to the court, Mr Hasan said his former work partner “displayed increasingly erratic and bizarre behaviour, including attacks on staff and me, verbal and written tirades against me and members staff” in the period leading up to his resignation.

His alleged behavior including kicking an intern and leaving him on the verge of tears, confiscating his company car through multiple parking fines and multiple references to Nazi Germany.

Mr. Hasan told the judge that he and Mr. Pisano teamed up at the law firm in 2012 and initially things went well.

But a “clash of personalities and an argument” between the two men led Mr Pisano to begin exhibiting behavior that “was inexplicable in any sensible way”, Judge Monty said.

Summarizing Mr Hasan’s evidence, the judge said it was alleged that “Mr Pisano routinely shouts and swears at staff, causing harassment, alarm and stress, and he treats trainees in a degrading manner”.

He went on to make a specific allegation that Mr Pisano became angry with a male intern from the firm on a placement at Surrey University.

He was said to have “shouted abuse at him and repeatedly applied his knee to the chair in which he was sitting so that the chair was gradually and repeatedly pushed against the wall … he then threw out a bag containing plastic bottles, but his foot followed so that it kicked him in the ankle, leaving him “on the brink of tears”.

That incident caused a “breakdown” in relations between the firm and the university, the judge said, adding that in its wake “Mr Pisano then wrote a series of letters claiming he had been defamed, demanding a written apology … and threatening . legal action against the university”.

“He also called the Law Society’s ethics helpline in the presence of a company employee and gave what is said to have been a rambling account of events, including references to HM the Queen and Nazi Germany,” later sending a letter to the Solicitors Regulation Authority which “referred to the British Army, the RAF and the Vatican”.

Mr Pisano had made several references to the Nazis, leading the judge to conclude that “it is clear to me that Mr Pisano has a fixation on Nazi Germany”.

He said one example was that Mr Pisano had “opened in his computer browser, as seen by staff, a page relating to the Night of the Long Knives, the term given to the Nazi party’s execution of political opponents in 1934”.

“It is difficult to think of any less appropriate behavior or behavior in the workplace,” he added.

“There was further inappropriate behavior on the part of Mr. Pisano in sending an email to a female client (saying)…” Domenico respectfully urges and invites you to step back and remove your velitism, intentions and reactions innate and instinctive. In short, please tie your tongue. to your ankles and hold your hands Dominic wishes you well”.

“It is hardly surprising that the company’s staff found it impossible to work with Mr. Pisano,” the judge commented.

Other incidents included Mr Pisano having his company car impounded by the police due to multiple parking fines and, after his resignation, “arranging for the police to go to the applicant’s offices to assist him in recovering some property which included a copy of the samurai sword”.

Mr Pisano also told the judge in his evidence: “I’ve trained with the Parachute Regiment, I’m trained to use weapons, I can fly solo gliders, I’m an RAF pilot… I have adequate military training.”

The judge said: “Mr Pisano came across as a rather strange and deluded individual with a poor grasp of reality. Mr. Pisano did not say that he felt any ill.

— What led this apparently experienced lawyer to act in the way he did is a mystery.

“If it was, as I believe it might have been, because of a personality clash with Mr Hasan and the dispute between them, that does not excuse his behaviour, which was inexplicable in any sensible way.

“This was, I believe, the play out of a hopeless and baseless vendetta against Mr. Hasan.

“I find it impossible to accept any of his evidence on the issues in this case where it conflicts with the evidence of Mr Hasan, whose evidence I accept in full,” he added.

The judge ordered the debts to be secured on a number of properties in which Mr Pisano has a stake, including his home in Victoria Road, New Barnet.

The judge added that Mr Pisano is now the subject of an investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and granted a permanent anti-harassment injunction against him in relation to Dominic Levent Solicitors Ltd and its staff.

Mr Pisano is still a 50% shareholder in the company.