The Court of Appeal has ruled that the Law Society will go on trial for allowing a fraudster to penetrate its ‘Find a Solicitor’ service.
Defunct law firm Schubert Murphy sued the Law Society after it acted on behalf of a client, Nico Christofi, who intended to purchase a £735k house in Hadley Wood, North London. The property was subject to a £843k charge in favour of Lloyds TSB. When a firm calling itself Acorn solicitors popped up and claimed to act for Lloyds, Schubert Murphy used the Law Society's Find a Solicitor tool to check that Acorn and its principal, John Dobbs, were legitimate. Both appeared on the database, and so the firm proceeded to pay over Christofi's £735k to Acorn. Which promptly disappeared with the money.
A police investigation revealed that Dobbs was a conman who had stolen the identity of a genuine, retired solicitor called John Clayman. Dobbs mocked up a deed poll purporting to change Clayman's name to his own, then submitted it to the SRA asking the regulator to change its records to reflect Clayman's new name. It complied, and Dobbs was then able to run riot. First he applied for a new practising certificate as John Dobbs, and then the right to practice as a sole practitioner under the name Acorn Solicitors. As a result he was subsequently listed on the Law Soc's ‘Find a Solicitor’ page which, at the time (but no longer) promised, "When choosing a solicitor" on its database, "you can be confident they are professionally qualified and properly regulated".
Schubert Murphy’s insurers settled a negligence claim brought by Christofi, but it sued the Law Society when the SRA refused to pay out from its compensation fund on the grounds that Dobbs was not a solicitor, but a devious git who had run away. The Law Society has now failed in its appeal for the case to be dismissed, with the Court of Appeal ruling that it was "not suitable" to strike it out.
A Law Society spokesman told RollOnFriday that the dodgy data had been provided by the SRA, and in a statement said, “We note the judgment and will be considering it in detail over the coming days”.
Charles Dougherty QC of 2 Temple Gardens, who acted for Schubert Murphy, said that if the Law Society had been successful, "professional and regulatory bodies could never be liable for inaccurate statements made on websites as to who is – or is not – authorised or regulated by them, however careless they were".
Tip Off ROF
Defunct law firm Schubert Murphy sued the Law Society after it acted on behalf of a client, Nico Christofi, who intended to purchase a £735k house in Hadley Wood, North London. The property was subject to a £843k charge in favour of Lloyds TSB. When a firm calling itself Acorn solicitors popped up and claimed to act for Lloyds, Schubert Murphy used the Law Society's Find a Solicitor tool to check that Acorn and its principal, John Dobbs, were legitimate. Both appeared on the database, and so the firm proceeded to pay over Christofi's £735k to Acorn. Which promptly disappeared with the money.
A police investigation revealed that Dobbs was a conman who had stolen the identity of a genuine, retired solicitor called John Clayman. Dobbs mocked up a deed poll purporting to change Clayman's name to his own, then submitted it to the SRA asking the regulator to change its records to reflect Clayman's new name. It complied, and Dobbs was then able to run riot. First he applied for a new practising certificate as John Dobbs, and then the right to practice as a sole practitioner under the name Acorn Solicitors. As a result he was subsequently listed on the Law Soc's ‘Find a Solicitor’ page which, at the time (but no longer) promised, "When choosing a solicitor" on its database, "you can be confident they are professionally qualified and properly regulated".
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"Ok Dobbs, this is it. You can be anyone, anything." S-O-L-I-C-I-T-O-R "Damn it." |
Schubert Murphy’s insurers settled a negligence claim brought by Christofi, but it sued the Law Society when the SRA refused to pay out from its compensation fund on the grounds that Dobbs was not a solicitor, but a devious git who had run away. The Law Society has now failed in its appeal for the case to be dismissed, with the Court of Appeal ruling that it was "not suitable" to strike it out.
A Law Society spokesman told RollOnFriday that the dodgy data had been provided by the SRA, and in a statement said, “We note the judgment and will be considering it in detail over the coming days”.
Charles Dougherty QC of 2 Temple Gardens, who acted for Schubert Murphy, said that if the Law Society had been successful, "professional and regulatory bodies could never be liable for inaccurate statements made on websites as to who is – or is not – authorised or regulated by them, however careless they were".
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