Regina lawyer Tony Merchant is well-known for his work on Indian residential school cases. (File/CBC)

A Regina lawyer whose firm pursued class-action suits on behalf of former Indian residential school students, customers of telecommunications giant BCE and people who say they got listeriosis from eating tainted Maple Leaf meat has been temporarily suspended from practising law.

In a decision released Thursday, the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal has upheld a ruling by the Law Society of Saskatchewan and ordered Tony Merchant to serve a two-week suspension.

The law society found Merchant guilty of conduct unbecoming a lawyer for an unauthorized withdrawal of trust funds in a divorce case where Merchant represented the wife.

According to the appeal court, Merchant had been ordered by a Court of Queen's Bench judge to hold the proceeds of the sale of the family home in trust until a trial or further court order.

Following the trial, the court ordered the sale proceeds to be distributed between the husband and wife in specified amounts.

However, Merchant resisted the husband's demands for payment of his share and later used the funds to satisfy the court costs assessed in the wife's favour.

Months later, the court eventually approved payment of some of the wife's court costs from the husband's funds, but the amount was less than what was originally taken by Merchant.