A Liverpool lawyer has been fined £5,000 for flirting with a vulnerable client.

Andrew Lee sent WhatsApp messages to a woman for whom he was acting in a domestic violence matter in which he called her a "right glaour puss" and her boyfriend a "cheeky twat".

Lee was working as an associate in the Liverpool firm Gregory Abrams Davidson when he sent the messages over a nine day period in 2013. Having referred the woman to the Independent Domestic Violence Advisory service (IDVA), Lee was dobbed in when an IDVA manager spotted a message on her phone in which Lee said "you always look lovely".

"For you"

The woman, known as 'Ms SS' in the proceedings, told the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal that Lee's messages had made her "physically sick" and claimed that she only replied because she didn't want to upset the man fighting for her child. However, the tribunal noted that she appeared to be a "willing participant" in the exchanges, although that "did not mean they were appropriate" given her vulnerability at the time. It said that Lee's messages made for "uncomfortable reading", and reading this soppy nonsense, in which Lee says he'd get locked up for his client, it's hard to disagree:

	Bleugh
	Hurl
	Vom
	Barf

The tribunal found that Lee "had flirted with his client when it was his duty to recognise her vulnerability and avoid preying on it".  It also found that the frequency of the messages was inappropriate and "amounted to an intrusion" into Ms SS's private life. However, although Lee was fined £5,000 for inappropriate behaviour, three further charges were not upheld and a £47,000 costs request submitted by the SRA was slashed to £3,500.