Elena Quinlivan

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

The Respondent, admitted in 2008, was convicted at Southwark Crown Court on seven counts of conspiracy to obtain a money transfer by deception (mortgage frauds totalling over £1.3 million committed 2003-2005, before admission) and sentenced to two years' imprisonment plus a confiscation order of £108,405.46. Proceeding in her absence, the Tribunal found that by virtue of her conviction she breached Rules 1.01, 1.02 and 1.06 of the Solicitors Code of Conduct 2007. Dishonesty was not expressly pleaded, so the Tribunal declined to deal with the matter on that basis and made no express finding of dishonesty. The misconduct was found to be at the highest level of seriousness. She was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay costs of £2,500.

Duties found breached:

• No conflict between current clients
• Uphold public trust in the profession

Aggravating factors:

• Misconduct involved the commission of a criminal offence
• Misconduct repeated and continued over a period of time (two-and-a-half years)
• Motivated by personal profit
• Involved a very large amount of money (mortgages over £1.3 million)
• Convicted on seven counts
• Ought reasonably to have known she was in material breach of obligations to protect the public and the reputation of the profession

Mitigating factors:

• Pleaded guilty in the criminal proceedings
• Sentencing judge referred to 'very real mitigation'