Jayanthi Reddy Saganti

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

Sole practitioner at Jusprowess Solicitors admitted all allegations under an Agreed Outcome. She dishonestly misappropriated £80,000 from client account over nine months (Jan-Sep 2018) to fund office refurbishment and expenses, repaying it in December 2018. The firm had no proper accounting systems or reconciliations since 2013, failed to replace a minimum client account shortage of £245,100, made £165,100 in payments based on fraudulent (hacked) emails, breached an undertaking to AS Solicitors, and borrowed £80,000 from a client without advising independent legal advice. The Tribunal expressly found dishonesty and no exceptional circumstances, and struck her off the Roll. Costs of £4,000 ordered.

Duties found breached:

• No conflict between current clients
• No improper use of client money
• Accounting records, reconciliation and reports
• Firm governance, systems and compliance
• Honour professional undertakings

Aggravating factors:

• Dishonest conduct
• Misappropriation of client money over a sustained nine-month period
• Respondent was COLP, COFA and MLRO at the firm
• Accounting failures persisting since 2013 with no reconciliations ever performed