Current pandemic and financial woes make this a good time to rethink our approach to professional ethics, Russell-Cooke senior partner John Gould writes in this week’s NLJ
Gould asks: are current sanctions too harsh, and should firms share the responsibility for individual misconduct? He highlights recent controversy over the newly-qualified Capsticks solicitor struck off after losing a briefcase, panicking and trying to cover up her mistake.
‘Sometimes individual justice must give way to the public interest in deterrence,’ he writes.
‘Deterrence is, however, better served by the probability of detection than exemplary punishment for a very few. Would a solicitor be significantly less likely to risk an untruth to a colleague if the risk was, say, only suspension or some other published and painful sanction rather than the end of a career?’
@RussellCooke @newlawjournal
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