Gambling Addiction: Cape Cod Attorney

A Cape Cod attorney, John "Jack" Roberts, betrayed his clients, destroyed his life and sacrificed his license to practice law because of his gambling addiction. Even smart people can succumb.

Builder repaid for lawyer's theft

A contractor bilked out of more than a half million dollars by a Cape attorney is getting his money back.

It's the second largest award ever granted by the Massachusetts Clients Security Board, a quasi state panel that makes good on money stolen from attorneys' clients.

Norman Sasville, 63, of Middleboro was awarded $656,000 by the state board. He's one of 92 clients awarded $2.4 million by the board this year, according to a press release issued this week.

The board, which the Supreme Judicial Court established 35 years ago to restore a level of trust in the legal profession, uses money from a $300 fee licensed attorneys pay annually.

Sasville was bilked out of the money by John "Jack" Roberts, 60, a Dennis attorney who has since been disbarred. Roberts pleaded guilty in May to embezzling the money from Sasville.

Though Roberts was ordered to make restitution, it's doubtful Sasville would have seen his money any time soon. Roberts was disbarred in 2007 and had just finished serving house arrest when Sasville's case came to light.

In 2007, Roberts was found guilty of stealing $137,000 from the estate of Alice May, a Sandwich woman who died at 95. The state board has also reimbursed May's estate.

Reached by phone Thursday evening, Sasville declined to comment.

In 2009, Sasville told the Times that Roberts took advantage of him when he was at his most vulnerable. Sasville hired Roberts in 2001 and gave him power of attorney to pay his bills, including the college tuition for his children, while he was in jail serving two years of a four-year sentence for operating under the influence of alcohol.

According to the website for the Massachusetts Clients Security Board, Roberts was hired by Sasville in 2001 after the Middleboro man was severely injured in a motorcycle crash and convicted on a drunken driving charge.

Sasville agreed to pay Roberts $6,000 to take care of his financial affairs "because he had known him for 25 years and trusted him," according to the state board's website.

"Mr. Roberts collected $1,356,909.49, disbursed $700,994.89 to or for the benefit of (Sasville), and misappropriated the balance for his gambling addiction," the board stated in its narrative on the case.

Before his motorcycle crash, Sasville had been a successful framing contractor on Cape Cod, where he worked on projects such as Deer Crossing in Mashpee and Ballymeade in Falmouth, he told the Times in 2009.

"Do you know how many nails you have to bang to amass that kind of money?" Sasville said at the time. "I'm back swinging a hammer again. I was hoping to retire."

In the theft of money from the Sandwich woman's estate, Roberts was named the trustee of the woman's will, again taking advantage of a trusted relationship, May's daughter Nancy Allen told the Times in 2009.

Roberts also used that money to fuel his online gambling habit, records show.