Christopher James Fry

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

Mr Fry completed a Statement of Means in May 2023 during prior disciplinary proceedings in which he answered 'no' to whether he had disposed of any asset worth over £1,000 in the previous three years, despite having sold a property he solely owned for £555,000 in December 2022, receiving £5,000 from the proceeds and asserting entitlement to a retained balance of £47,134.55. The Tribunal found his answer was false and misleading and that he knew this. It rejected his claim that the property was not an asset and found his conduct dishonest, in breach of Principles 2, 4 and 5 and Paragraph 1.4 of the Code. Mr Fry left the hearing before sanction and the Tribunal proceeded in his absence. Given the dishonesty finding and absence of exceptional circumstances, he was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay costs of £32,857.50, not to be enforced without leave of the Tribunal.

Duties found breached:

• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank
• Good faith and courtesy to colleagues

Aggravating factors:

• Motivated by own financial advantage
• Planned and deliberate omission to conceal the sale of property and proceeds
• Deliberately misled the Tribunal and the SRA regarding his means
• Previous similar disciplinary matter (providing inaccurate/misleading information in a PII proposal form)