What avenues are open for the intervened solicitor, asks Chris Gadd
This is the story of a solicitor who lost everything (let us call him X). In December 2009, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) decided to intervene into X’s practice without any warning whatsoever. They convened their intervention committee in secret and presented to them a report that X had not seen. They prepared a draft resolution for the committee, a resolution that was adopted word for word. They then wrote to Barclays Bank and froze the practice bank accounts. Only then did they fax the intervention notice to X at 5.45pm.
The following morning, the SRA arrived at X’s office and took everything away. A week before Christmas he had to tell his staff that nobody would be paid, and that the firm had been forcibly closed. Then he had to go home to his family and ponder his future.
History
X’s “crime” was that he had briefly been a partner with a crooked solicitor at a previous firm, had reported that
