Bina Maistry

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

The Respondent, a solicitor and partner at ABM Solicitors, faced three allegations. She misled a Judge on 27 August 2015 by allowing him to believe she was a barrister and failing to correct his misapprehension in order to deflect criticism from herself and her firm. She then sent a misleading email to another solicitor (M & P) on 28 September 2015 falsely asserting she was fresh to the case and had had no dealings with it, when emails showed she had supervised the paralegal ES. Finally, in April 2016 and February 2017 she attempted to mislead the SRA by creating false attendance notes, purportedly drafted by the junior fee earner ES, recording supervision by Mr L which had not taken place. The Tribunal found all allegations proved beyond reasonable doubt, including express findings of dishonesty on all three occasions, applying the Ivey test. The Tribunal found the Respondent not credible, concluded there were no exceptional circumstances, and struck her off the Roll of Solicitors, ordering costs of £4,500 without deferment.

Duties found breached:

• Not mislead the court
• Honesty
• Integrity
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank
• Cooperate openly with regulators

Aggravating factors:

• Acted dishonestly on three separate occasions
• Conduct was deliberate, calculated and repeated over a period of time
• Attempted to conceal true supervision position by creating false attendance notes
• Ought reasonably to have known conduct breached obligations to protect public and profession's reputation
• Previous appearance before the Tribunal in March 2011 (fined £2,000, costs £10,000, for supervision failings and non-disclosure to mortgagee clients)

Mitigating factors:

• Number of good character references
• Limited admissions in relation to allegation 1.3
• Accepted the facts of the case