GP hauled before court over phoney lawyer’s long COVID med certificates
She admitted she was 'misled' by the supposed lawyer, who used the certificates to delay her deportation hearing
A GP was duped into writing multiple medical certificates for a ‘lawyer’ with long COVID who turned out to be a wannabe cafe manager trying to delay her deportation hearing, a court has found.
On Tuesday, the Gold Coast–based GP was called before the Federal Circuit and Family Court to explain why she had supplied multiple medical certificates for Yanan Zhu, which resulted in her hearing being rescheduled five times.
She explained Ms Zhu, her patient since 2019, told her that she was a lawyer and had ongoing COVID-19 symptoms that would prevent her from functioning at the “high intellectual level” demanded by the courts.
She said Ms Zhu had given her a business card at their first consultation, which stated she was a lawyer.
