Christopher Michael Haddock

Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision

Christopher Michael Haddock, a partner, COLP and COFA at Haddock and Company, accepted a £25,000 loan from his lay client Andrew Bell on 13 November 2017, creating an own interest conflict, and caused it to be paid into the firm's client account in breach of the Solicitors Accounts Rules (using the client account as a banking facility). In or around January 2018 he prepared a misleading, backdated agreement (dated 10 November 2017) purporting to show the loan monies were a fixed fee for legal work. The Tribunal found all allegations proved in full, including dishonesty in respect of Allegations 1.2 and 1.3. He was struck off the Roll of Solicitors, with no order for costs made on account of his means.

Duties found breached:

• No conflict between current clients
• No improper use of client money
• Proper basis for allegations

Aggravating factors:

• Conduct found to be dishonest (Allegations 1.2 and 1.3)
• Prepared a misleading, backdated agreement to conceal that the £25,000 was a loan
• Transfers from client account to office account made when firm's overdraft was close to its limit