Ehsan Kabir & Second Respondent

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

Joint disciplinary proceedings against two solicitors of No.1 Solicitors. Many allegations (including that the firm was run as two sham businesses) were found not proved to the criminal standard. The First Respondent (Ehsan Kabir) was found to have dishonestly given misleading and contradictory information to the SRA (allegation 1.9) regarding when the Second Respondent ceased to be a director and the status of the shareholders agreement; applying Ivey, this was dishonest, breaching Principles 2, 6 and 7, and he was struck off (no exceptional circumstances per Sharma/James). He was ordered to pay costs of £35,473.91. The Second Respondent was found to have committed several breaches relating to unauthorised practice, lack of professional indemnity insurance, a misleading website, failure to notify a material change, and working as a paralegal without a practising certificate, but no dishonesty or lack of integrity was found (her breaches considered inadvertent). She received a 12-month suspension, itself suspended for 2 years, with indefinite restrictions on practice, and was ordered to pay total costs of £42,227.75 across both case numbers (£17,736.96 + £24,490.79).

Duties found breached:

• Not mislead the court
• Handle inadvertently received material
• Professional indemnity insurance
• Hold a current practising certificate
• Not misrepresent regulated status

Aggravating factors:

• Dishonesty (First Respondent)
• Repeated/continued conduct rather than a single act
• Knew or ought to have known conduct was harmful to the reputation of the profession
• Complicated and extended the SRA's investigation (First Respondent)
• Second Respondent: repeated breaches, lack of familiarity with fundamental practice rules, and a previous SRA rebuke for similar unauthorised practice/insurance failings

Mitigating factors:

• First Respondent: relative youth and inexperience (under three years PQE), difficult family circumstances, no previous disciplinary findings
• Second Respondent: genuine regret and insight, admissions to most allegations, difficult personal circumstances (claimed abusive relationship), no previous Tribunal findings

⚠ figures not found verbatim in the source were dropped: ["unverified_costs_amount=77701.66"]